ROUND ABOUT 
JERUSALEM 



REV J.E.WRIGHT 



Qass JilO^ 
Book__^V^ 



ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 



ROUND ABOUT 
JERUSALEM 

LE'tTERS FROMmE HOLT LAND 




BY 

. J. E. WRIGHT, B.A. 



ILLUSTRATED 



SECOND IMPRESSION 



JARROLDS 
PUBLISHERS (LONDON) 
LIMITED 



/ ^9 
DEDICATED 

BY PERMISSION 

TO THE 

Right Reverend R. MacINNES, D.D. 
lord bishop in jerusalem 
and the east 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Foreword by the Rt. Rev. the Lord Bishop of 



London , , . , , , , . vii 

Off for Palestine .... . . , i 

The Feast of Purim . • • . , . .21 

The Jewish Passover 37 

Samaria and the Samaritan Passover . . .81 

Daily Sights and Tales . • . t . • 95 

Ascension Day,. 1912 ... ... . 105 

The Convent of the Cross • . . • • iii 

The Siloam Tunnel 117 

"Neby Samwil" ........ 125 

The Whirlwind 137 

" Petra" 143 

Ramulla 173 

Wady Kelt . , 181 

Back to Palestine 239 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



TO FACE PAGE 



Rebecca's Tomb, Palestine. . • Frontispiece / 

7/ 



Jerusalem : Shepherd and Sheep at the Damascus 
Gate 



„ Friday Afternoon at the Jews' Wailing 

Place , , , c . , \ 

„ . The Mosque of Omar, with Site of 

King Solomon's Temple . , . i^-^ 

„ Mount of Olives AND Gethsemane . 18^ 

The Garden of Gethsemane. The Olive Tree 

Stumps are said to date from the Time of Christ 47 v 

Jericho , . • . ... • , . 63 \/ 

General View of the Northern Temples and Tombs 
OF the Rock City of Petra discovered in 1812, 

AFTER having BEEN LOST TO THE WORLD FOR 

1500 Years , . . , . » . . 147 

Petra : The Wonderful Temple of Ed-Dier carved 
entirely out of the Living Rock. This Wonder- 
ful Deserted City is 70 Miles North-east of , 
THE Gulf of Ahala , 161 ^ 

At the Well of Cana of Galilee , • • • 197 V 

Tiberius and the Sea of Galilee . * • . 200V 

The Wonderful Monastery of Mar Saba, near the 

Dead Sea . . , , . . . . 232 



FOREWORD 



Everything about Jerusalem is read with 
the greatest interest, especially now, and 
therefore, as Chairman of Jerusalem and^ 
the East Mission, it gives me great pleasure 
to write a Foreword to these letters brightly ^ 
written by a young clergyman now acting 
as Bishop Maclnnes chaplain, I saw him 
as a young layman in Jerusalem when I 
was there myself and afterwards ordained 
him in London. The letters speak for 
themselves and give a clear and vivid accowit 
of what may be seen 

"ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM." 

* A, F, LONDON. 



St. Barnabas' Day, 1918. 



PREFATORY NOTE 



The following are extracts from letters 
written home from Jerusalem. The writer 
is again in the East and has had no oppor- 
tunity for revising them. 



I 



OFF FOR PALESTINE 



ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

OFF FOR PALESTINE 

Leaving Port Said we found the sea was 
absolutely calm, the sky one blaze of stars, 
and the air rather chilly. I made up my 
mind to spend the night in a deck chair in 
order to see the sun rise over the Judaean 
hills. The colours of the sunrise were 
simply grand, though unfortunately there 
was not a cloud to be seen. 

We reached Jaffa about 7 a.m., and as 
soon as the doctor had been rowed from the 
shore, a distance of about half a mile, we 
were at once surrounded by a crowd of big 
rowing boats full of sailors, porters, etc., all 
very anxious to take us to land. 

Old Jaffa is built on a hill overhanging 
the sea, and is simply one mass of buildings 
honey-combed with passages, making a per- 
fect maze of tunnels and narrow alleys* 

3 



4 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

Scarcely anywhere is there a space of more 
than lo feet, and in general the streets 
seem to be from three to six feet wide— a 
kind of human ant-heap. I will not attempt 
to describe the smells except by saying that 
only here and there can you see the cobble- 
stones for the refuse thrown out from the 
buildings. We climbed upon the roof of the 
house said to stand on the site of Simon the 
Tanner's home, and in the heat of the morn- 
ing we could easily understand how St. Peter 
might have dozed off whilst meditating upon 
the roof. As I stood there looking over 
the sea I thought how wonderfully like a 
great sheet it seemed, stretching away to the 
horizon ; also the reef of rocks just appear- 
ing above the surface, about 200 yards 
out, looked quite like animals crawling on 
the sheet. I can't help thinking that this 
sight might have caused the imagery of 
St. Peter's day-dream. He may also have 
heard the classical legend which connects 
these rocks with the sea monster petrified 
by Perseus who saved Andromeda. The 
passage through them is so narrow that our 
boatmen had to draw in their oars on one 



OFF FOR PALESTINE 5 

side in order to pass through. No wonder 
it is so frequent that landings cannot be 
effected. ;They say that it often happens 
that the mail is delayed either way a fort- 
night or more, and all agree that we were 
very lucky to get ashore so easily. 

We went over the C.M.S. hospital, which 
seems to be doing a good work, and is 
crowded with both in- and out-patients. Of 
course these buildings, like many others, are 
outside the real town of Jaffa, where there 
is more room. We lunched at the Jerusalem ' 
Hotel, where the bedrooms are named after 
the twelve Apostles and other saints. 

The Plain of Sharon and Valley of 

AlJALON. 

At 1.30 we boarded the train for Jeru- 
salem, but from the pace it went and from 
the look of the carnages it was more like 
four trams linked together and pulled by an 
asthmatical steam-roller. For some way we 
went through the middle of a large orange- 
grove, where the oranges were hanging in 
clusters, which made one wonder how the 



6 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

small trees could possibly stand the weight. 
We then passed out on to the absolutely 
level Plain of Sharon, all under cultivation 
and very fertile. But for the range of Judaean 
hills in the distance one might have been 
between Peterborough and King's Lynn. 
Here the Philistines used to live as they did 
also on the rolling hills which we had to 
ascend before reaching the foot of the pre- 
cipitous Judsean mountains. 

One gets a very fine view here of the 
Valley of Aijalon, and one hardly requires 
any imagination to picture the Canaanites 
rushing away down the valley before the 
pursuing Israelites. Barren and rugged as 
it is (it reminds one of Kirkstone Pass, 
Cumberland), it can in no way be compared 
to the awful grandeur and indescribable soli- 
tude of the rock chasm into which we next 
entered. The whole of the rest of the way 
(some 20 miles) to Jerusalem is up this 
barren valley. The higher we go the less 
precipitous are the sides. From time to 
time we cross wadies," or dried-up torrent- 
beds, as they run into each other on their 
way down to the plain. I rode all the way 



OFF FOR PALESTINE 7 

sitting on the step of the car, and seriously 
thought once or twice of getting off to take 
a photo, and then get on again further down 
the train. 

Jerusalem. 

The Jerusalem station is at the top of this 
long winding valley, on a plateau, but a good 
way from the city, which stands on a hill 
between two wadies," which go down the 
other side of the ridge towards the Dead 
Sea. 

After a few weeks one begins to sort out 
the various impressions, which at first are most 
overwhelming. This country seems to be 
chiefly characterized by its inextricable con- 
fusion. The language, time, money, stamps, 
posts, religions, calendars, seem all in a per- 
fect state of chaos. The time, for instance. 
There is Arabic time, which has to vary 
from day to day, as it must begin from sun- 
set. There are several of these clocks. 
Then there is European time, but as this is 
not official it is not standardized. Each 
vessel which arrives at Jaffa coming from 
different ports brings its own particular 



8 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

version. This finds its way up to Jerusalem, 
and affects some though not all of the clocks 
here. Mine plods on and manages to keep 
in with the chimes of a big " Latin clock 
close by, but the little watch has entirely 
lost its head, and by varying its pace strikes 
out quite a new line of its own. The 
Moslem time seems something similar to 
ours under the Daylight Saving Bill 

To-day is Sunday, the Jews keep Saturday, 
and the Moslems Friday ; but this is not all. 
The Hotel Calendar tells me that to-day is 
the 1 8th of the month (English), the 5th 
(Greek), nth (Coptic), ist (Moslem), and 
30th (Jewish). Of course, Easter is on 
different dates. Not only are English and 
French coins in circulation, but the Turkish 
coins vary in value in different towns. It is 
a profitable trade to change " metaliks " into 
*'bishliks** here, and change them back 
again at Jaffa. Money changing must be 
very profitable judging from the number of 
"tables of the money changers" I pass 
every day. These are little tables with 
glass or wire-netting tops (and a drawer full 
of coins. 



OFF FOR PALESTINE 9 

The Germans, the Austrians, the French, 
the Italians and the Russians, etc., have each 
established their own postal system in spite 
of the official Turkish post, but they are not 
allowed by the Government to use the train 
for Jaffa. Europeans do not use the Turkish 
post, as it is so uncertain, the result being 
that the Turks sometimes waylay the other 
postal vans, lest their own should be entirely 
neglected. An extremely complicated list 
is put up in the hotel each week, saying 
when the various mails may come or go if a 
landing is possible at Jaffa or not. To crown 
all, the whole military and civil system is an 
absurd tangle of intrigue, suspicion, and 
bribery. It took several months to get the 
Christ Church tubular bells out of the 
Custom house, as the officials, seeking a 
bribe, made out that we wanted to use them 
as guns. Whilst I am writing, a recruiting 
sergeant is extorting money out of a waiter 
who does not want to be a conscript, by a 
system of blackmail. One can easily see 
how the old "Publicans" must have been 
hated. 

After three days* wind, hail, and wet, the 

B 



lo ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

weather is again beautiful. The rain comes 
at intervals of two or three weeks during 
the winter, but it is perfectly dry from May 
to October, when a storm would destroy the 
harvests (cf. i Sam. xii. 16-19, ^.nd Prov. 
xxvi. i) ; hence these rains are extremely 
valuable, and every square yard of roof 
space is used for collecting the water which 
goes down into large underground cisterns, 
where it is kept cool and fresh, though it 
has to be filtered before using. When it 
does rain, it comes down with tremendous 
force. You can imagine the state of these 
dirty roads. I am reading through Ezra 
and Nehemiah, and after wallowing along in 
the mud appreciate the difficulty in Ezra x. 9. 
The cistern just in front of my window as I 
write is as big as *two or three rooms put 
together ; just now it is quite full, and yet 
they tell me that they often have to send 
miles away to springs before the winter rains 
begin again. 

It seems curious that this little spot (for 
the whole city is very small, and I could 
easily walk round it in an hour) should be 
such a centre for religions, and exercise such 



() 



OFF FOR PALESTINE ii 

an attraction to pilgrims of all nationalities 
and creeds. It is the centre and only con= 
solation of the Jews, who have always had 
an almost fanatical love for the place which 
they claim " God chose to set His Name 
there." .Their great hope is the ultimate 
possession of the place, when they will be 
able to continue the sacrifices which they 
may only offer here, and which therefore 
they have been unable to offer for all these 
centuries. It is quite an inspiration to go 
down to their wailing-place where remain 
the huge blocks of stone supporting the area 
on which their Temple once stood (where the 
mosque now stands). The wailing is not in 
the least a ceremonious kind of service of 
any particular form, though they do have 
such services there, but you see them quietly 
and alone with the tears streaming down 
their faces, stroking the stones in a loving 
way with their hands, kissing them, burying 
their heads in their hands and sobbing, lean- 
ing up against the wall and imploring God 
to take pity upon them and restore again 
to them their city. The scene is most im- 
pressive and pathetic. It is similar, though 



12 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

not nearly so impressive, at Rachel's tomb 
on the way to Bethlehem (cf. Gen. xxxv. 19, 
20). The Jews here are very much on the 
increase and a large part of Jerusalem is 
known as the Jewish quarter. They are 
still very exact in keeping the Law. They 
mostly close their shops some hours before 
sunset on Friday to make quite sure of being 
on the safe side ; the result is that Saturday 
is a much quieter day in the city than 
Sunday. 

A large party of us have been to King 
Solomon's quarries. We entered through the 
only known opening (a hole in the rock 
under the wall by the Damascus Gate) ; for 
an hour and a half we walked about through 
the most wonderful passages cut in the rock 
under Jerusalem, almost all broad enough, 
if level, to drive three carriages abreast, the 
sides and roof being of pure white stone. 
We had candles, lamps, torches, and bits of 
magnesium wire. Here and there were vast 
halls large enough to take literally thousands 
of people. Everywhere were huge blocks of 
stone partly quarried out in varying stages, 
so that you could see exactly how it was 



OFF FOR PALESTINE 13 

done, and everywhere mountains of chips 
showing that they had been dressed before 
removing (cf. i Kings vi. 7). Everywhere 
were swarms of bats. In two places they were 
clustered on the ceiling like a swarm of bees. 

We also went to the leper hospital, a 
beautiful house and grounds belonging to 
the German Moravians, but the patients 
were too awful to describe. What a sacri- 
fice to give up one's life to nursing such 
repulsive objects ! It always attacks the 
hands, feet, face, and throat first, but not 
the body, so that many of them can neither 
walk, work, nor speak ; they are fearful to 
look at, blind, and have a peculiarly horrible 
smell of decay. The disease is not catching, 
but hereditary, hence those in the house are 
not allowed to marry or beg, and for this 
reason they cannot persuade some to come 
into the house. It is thought that the lepers 
mentioned in the New Testament had a 
different form of the disease or else were 
not in a bad stage, as they were able to cry 

Unclean !" These lepers are not allowed 
inside the city. (For the various kinds cf. 
Lev. xiii. and xiv.) 



14 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

Life IS very full. The other afternoon I 
went alone and sat for an hour on the Mount 
of Olives facing the Temple area, the other 
side of a deep valley, and could see all 
Jerusalem, the hills round and behind the 
Mountains of Moab, the Dead Sea, Plain 
of Jericho, and mouth of the Jordan. 

Sunday y A^th. Walked along the hill track 
towards Neby Samwil (House of Samuel), 
a wild desolate-looking country, with out- 
crops of rock everywhere, in which are 
countless sepulchral caves. Here was a 
fellah (peasant) scratching the little soil 
between the rocks with his native plough 
drawn by his ox and his ass yoked together — 
there on the higher hills was a native shep- 
herd wandering about in the midst of a 
flock of sheep and goats, which fed on what 
little scrub and weeds grow between the 
rocks. The other day I walked over from 
the Mount of Olives to Bethany, watched 
the women and girls coming out to the old 
well, chattering and drawing out water; 
when I reached them they let down again 
and drew for me to drink. Everybody 
here is most kind, and all seem to have 



OFF FOR PALESTINE 15 

combined the English openness and lack of 
ceremony with the Eastern boundless hos- 
pitality. I am very fortunate in having 
expert guides to all the different places, as 
of course some of the missionaries here are 
quite the best authorities. 

Jerusalem has a great fascination not only 
for the Jews and the Christians, but also 
for the Moslems. To a Mohammedan this 
place is only exceeded in sanctity by Mecca 
itself, since from the rock in their mosque 
on the Temple area Mohammed is said to 
have ascended to heaven, and it will be here 
in the Valley of Jehoshaphat that the last 
judgment (so they say) will take place, when 
all will have to cross the valley on one of 
Mohammed's hairs stretched from Mount 
Moriah to the Mount of Olives. The 
wicked will fall into the valley and be dashed 
to pieces, but the righteous will be borne 
along safely to the other side. They very 
jealously guard the Temple area where now 
their mosque stands, and if any Christian 
attempts to go near it without a soldier, they 
wave their hands menacingly in front of 
him, and if he pushes on will draw out 



i6 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

daggers and guns. If a Jew goes near they 
will set on him and stone him at once. On 
the other hand, it is said that no Jew would 
think of going there, for since he does not 
know the exact spot on the area where the 
Temple stood, he might by mistake tread on 
the " Holy of Holies." We are accustomed 
to look upon Palestine as the home of the 
Jews, but that is not at all the idea out here. 
The natives or fellaheen are descendants of 
the inhabitants of the land before the Israel- 
itish invasion, and are apparently entirely 
distinct from Jews, Turks, and Christians 
or Arabs. The Turks are the governing 
race (like the Romans of old) and the Jews 
and Europeans are only here on suffer- 
ance ; their quarters are called Jewish colony, 
German colony, etc., and yet there are more 
Jews here than any other single nationality 
(ie. in Jerusalem only). It seems to us a 
freak of Mohammedanism that they allow 
no one to go to Mecca or to their mosque 
here without a Government permit and 
guards, but the Greek Christians are as bad, 
for they would stone any Jew who dared to 
cross even the courtyard in front of the 



OFF FOR PALESTINE 17 

Church of the Sepulchre. It was only last 
week that, when out for a walk with one of 
the boys, I had to abandon a short cut home 
as I found the boy dare not cross the court- 
yard, yet the Turkish soldiers stand inside 
the church itself with bayonets or rifles to 
prevent disturbances, just as of old Roman 
soldiers kept watch over the Temple courts 
to prevent such a disturbance as took place 
in the time of St. Paul. The cases are 
parallel. In each the necessity for such a 
guard seems a scandal, yet there is none the 
less a necessity. In each case the guard is 
hated, yet they act with apparent justice 
and though not with reverence, at least 
respect. 

Where once the story was Roman, Jew, 
and Gentile, now the only difference is 
Moslem, Gentile, and Jew. In spite of the 
divergence in beliefs it is curious that all 
hold that the last judgment will take place 
in the Valley of Jehoshaphat between the 
Mount of Olives and the Temple area, the 
result being that one slope is now almost 
covered with Jewish graves, the other with 
Moslem ones. The Jews have a curious 



i8 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

superstition that all, when the last day 
comes, will have to worm their way along 
through the earth from their various graves 
to this place. They call it " The Gilgalim " 
or " rolling " ; this is the reason why they all 
wish to be buried here, so that they will not 
have so far to come. It is a wonder they 
don't practise burrowing like rabbits, and the 
Moslems tight-rope walking. 

We have been for a walk on the Mount 
of Olives and to see the Chapel of the 
Lord's Prayer, where this prayer is written 
on the walls in thirty-seven different 
languages, so that all pilgrims may find their 
own. If any one does not find it in his 
tongue he gives money towards having it 
put up. This costs ^40. 

One gets a glorious view from the Mount 
of Olives of the Jordan and Dead Sea. It is 
perfectly marvellous what you can see from 
the spot where the Ascension took place. 
Right down to the Mount of Hebron in the 
south, the Dead Sea, the Mountains of 
Moab and the Jordan Valley seem directly 
in front of you — they are really over 20 
miles away. You can see over the Judsean 



OFF FOR PALESTINE 19 

hills to the Mediterranean, and up north to 
the hills which divide Judaea from Samaria ; 
in fact, the whole of Judsea and a good deal 
of Moab. Jerusalem itself is so surrounded 
by hills that this view makes a wonderful 
contrast. 



THE FEAST OF PURIM 



THE FEAST OF PURIM 

The 4th of March is the Jewish Feast of 
Purim, when they commemorate the salvation 
of the Jews by Esther and Mordecai ; as a 
rule they are extremely temperate, but on 
this day it is their duty to drink and make 
merry, and this they do till they cannot 
distinguish between Haman and Mordecai. 
In the evening their Rabbi reads in the 
synagogue the book of Esther, and all attend 
to jeer every time the name of (Haman is 
mentioned. 

I went down with Mr. H — — and others 
into one of these synagogues. The scene 
was truly remarkable. The synagogue is a 
big room newly decorated and painted up, 
almost square. In the centre of the east 
side is a kind of gorgeous bookcase with 
curtains in which is kept the particular copy 
of the Law belonging to that congregation. 
In the centre is a raised platform in size and 

23 



24 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

shape just like a band-stand. On this plat- 
form at a table sat the Rabbi with his pray- 
ing shawl over his head, reading from a 
huge roll the book of Esther, and pausing 
each time for the jeers at the name of 
Haman. Crowding round him looking over 
his shoulders, and all round the room at 
little desks were Jews following in their own 
rolls and in a few cases books, almost all 
in a very merry state, anxiously waiting to 
make the most fearful din and uproar every 
time the name was mentioned. You can 
imagine the scene. I got one fellow to find 
the place in my Hebrew text for me ; it was 
the sixth and seventh chapters they were 
reading, where the name comes every two or 
three verses. Children were playing hide and 
seek and last touch " in amongst the desks, 
which were just scattered about in any order 
and direction. Everybody was violently 
swaying his body back and forward, keeping 
more or less in time with the Rabbi, as he 
sang out the words. The noise and con- 
fusion was considerable all the time, but at 
the name of Haman all stamped, thumped, 
beat the desks with sticks, and even fired off 



THE FEAST OF PURIM 25 



toy pistols and crackers. It reminded one 
of an exciting auction or the senseless 
speeches and applause at the close of a 
Cambridge bump supper." All seemed in 
the best of spirits. Of course it seems very 
terrible, but then the synagogue is only a 
room in which they meet. I do not think 
the Jews attach any idea of sacredness to it, 
and I suppose they cannot really worship 
according to the Law, till they have a 
Temple here again ; then also the synagogue 
may be to them only a means to keep alive 
the old traditions and customs, to teach the 
children and kindle a kind of patriotism 
which will preserve the race till their golden 
age returns. If that is so, such scenes and 
festivals would be very natural. A synagogue 
is not a temple or a church. But then the 
idea of behaviour in churches here is very 
different from our own. The churches are 
open all day long, there are no seats, but 
people are all strolling about talking to each 
other and standing about in groups. They 
will chatter for some time, and then without 
any ostentation will kneel down or even lie 
down, and pray, and then wander off and 

c 



26 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

join in with a service being sung by some 
priest at some altar, or perhaps some pro- 
cession wandering round the church. The 
whole idea seems extremely curious to us, 
but then it only depends upon what one's 
idea of a church is. I suppose their idea of 
a church is God's House, not that He dwells 
in temples built with hands, but the house 
where His children may meet, not so much 
with Him, for they can do that anywhere, 
but with each other. 

There is now in Jerusalem an enormous 
party of Americans (600 in all) and every 
hotel is packed. Americans are funrry 
creatures ; some of them seem about as 
ignorant of what they have come to see as 
if they were discovering a strange land. 
One of them told me the other day that 
the Mosque of Omar was the same as the 
Church of the Sepulchre. Another when 
he came back from spending a morning in 
the Church of the Sepulchre wanted to 
know if it was known what had become 
of the Body of Christ, as he found the tomb 
was open and empty ! I asked another .what 
he thought of the place, and he said it was 



THE FEAST OF PURIM 27 

all right, but he did not believe it was as 
many feet long as the guide books said, and 
he was determined not to be taken in at 
Samaria, so had procured a piece of string 
with a weight at the end to test the depth 
of Jacob s well. 

Of the private travellers many seem to 
have their peculiar interests. One is deeply 
anxious to convince me that the Russians 
and Germans are mentioned in Ezekiel, 
and started off on the subject when I first 
met him on the doorstep. 

One American confessed to being so 
mixed that he was not sure whether it was 
Christ or Mohammed who was crucified on 
Calvary. Another asked me whether the 
Lake of Galilee was inside or outside the 
walls. Asked if they had seen Bethesda 
they say, Wull, I doan't rightly know, but 
I guess we've done pretty nigh everything ; 
anyhow weVe got it down on a caard/' 

Another lady has been studying hiero- 
glyphics, and one only has to set her going 
by asking if Rameses II. belonged to the 
1 8th or 19th dynasty, and she will babble 
on till you leave the room. 



28 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

The other day I rode on a donkey 
through wild and rocky country to Ain 
Kharim. You can have no idea of the 
wildness of these hills. The donkeys are 
big and extremely sure-footed and they 
climb over the rocks like cats ; the jagged 
rocks stick up on the path so that several 
times I caught my foot on them, even when 
riding, and had to take care not to get it 
crushed like Balaam of old. These donkeys 
are wonderful creatures, and are known as 
Jerusalem ponies ; they are much bigger 
than ours. They are sturdy and can gallop 
for miles at a time on the better roads. 
They are very cheap to hire. You can 
easily do 15 miles in an afternoon, and it 
will only cost i to 1 -| francs, even if you take 
some one to assist your steed. Horses are 
from I ^ to 2 francs, but tourists pay much 
more. Ain Kharim is a beautiful almost 
Swiss-looking village situated in a deep 
ravine running west from here. It is said 
to have been the home of Elizabeth and the 
birthplace of John the Baptist. Mr. Schor's 
party of English has just arrived ; they have 
been doing the north, and are now finishing 



THE FEAST OF PURIM 29 



up here. Yesterday as they came from 
Nablous they saw the result of the terrible 
village blood feuds, which are handed down 
for generations. They found^ two poor men 
murdered by the roadside, one dead and 
the other dying, and the inhabitants of the 
neighbouring village setting out to avenge 
the murder. The Turks have a very clever 
way of catching the culprits in all cases of 
theft and crime. In each village or district 
the sheik or head man is given certain 
privileges in return for which he is respon- 
sible for the good conduct of all his people. 
If there is any disturbance he is at once 
taken prisoner and kept until the right men 
are secured for punishment. I believe this 
custom prevails over the East. 

Talking of outrages, the mail should have 
arrived to-day, but it has not. The reason 
is that some postmen who drive the mail 
cart up from Jaffa were shot at by some 
Indian Moslem fanatics, who killed three of 
them and the four horses, ransacking the mail 
with the hope of getting money. A woman 
has just been to the door weeping because her 
niece's husband was one of the men killed. 



30 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

We have just heard that the Italians have 
bombarded Smyrna, but know no particulars ; 
however, the head waiter here is a typical 
English one over for the season. He is 
really most amusing ; several times while I 
have been writing this he has come into the 
smoking-room to make a pretence of polish- 
ing up spotless glasses, but really to give 
me his views of the situation. He is very 
nervous, and I think if he heard a gun go 
off 90 miles away he would go and hide 
under a bed. He has just told me he has 
a first-class revolver and only wishes he 
had some practice with it. He gets hold 
of scraps of information and works himself 
up into an awful state. When he heard 
about Smyrna and the three postmen being 
killed on the way here, he mixed it all up 
and came to tell me an awful story, starting 
by saying, ''They have done it now, they 
have bombarded Samaria." When he was 
told that Samaria was well inland, he said, 
''Well, it's nearer than Beyrout, I think it's 
somewhere in the Dardanelles ; " and then 
went on to say the natives had begun to 
retaliate by murdering all the postmen. 



THE FEAST OF PURIM 31 

One wonders what a man like this would 
do if there really was any danger. 

Nearing Easter, — There are now probably 
10,000 Russian pilgrims here for Easter. 
An army of 1000 has just walked from 
Galilee. 

On Friday I went to see the first of the 
sights connected with Easter-time, The 
Moslems claim that by a vision the tomb of 
Moses (Neby Mussa) was discovered, and 
that he was buried on a hill on this side 
of the Dead Sea. Every year, just before 
the Greek Easter, they assemble in Jerusalem 
from all over the country, and after a service 
in the mosque (Temple area) they proceed 
in a religious procession all the way to Neby 
Mussa, where they encamp and hold their 
feast and fair for a whole week, after which 
they return in a similar procession to Jeru- 
salem, always arriving on the Thursday 
before the Greek Good Friday. Ostensibly 
it is entirely a religious affair, but in reality 
it is a political idea to ensure there being 
crowds of Moslems in Jerusalem at the time 
when all the pilgrims are most numerous, lest 



32 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

they should suddenly take possession of the 
city. Of course it is impossible for any 
Christian to go on the Temple area during 
the service — in fact, during the whole ten 
days — but enormous crowds gather along 
the road outside the city to see the pro- 
cession. They come out of St. Stephen's 
Gate and down into the Kedron Valley, and 
then by the Garden of Gethsemane, and on 
along the Jericho road past Bethany. I 
took three boys with me and Ali " ; we 
climbed on to a narrow ledge of a wall just 
outside the gate, where we had a fine view 
through the gate and up and down the road. 
As the time went on the whole neighbour- 
hood became packed with natives, and 
scattered about were foreigners from all over 
the world. It is impossible to describe the 
crowds of sightseers dressed in all the most 
gorgeous variety of colours imaginable. 
Every possible place of vantage (the city 
wall, the gate, the hills, and almost every 
stone) was occupied by a surging mass of 
highly excited but very good-humoured men, 
women, and children. Everywhere the orange 
and lemonade men seemed to be doing a 



THE FEAST OF PURIM 33 



roaring trade. Everybody was eating, drink- 
ing, and making merry. Sweets, nuts, buns, 
cakes, beans, etc., were so plentiful that they 
were not only eaten but also used for friendly 
missiles. One was particularly struck with 
the good humour of the crowd. Everything 
was shared, every one was treated to drinks, 
all teetotal. The idea seemed to be not to 
try and keep your own position to yourself, 
but to see how many others you could get 
on to your own stone. They had uproarious 
fun pulling up all their friends to our wall, 
and then holding each other on till some 
would laugh so much that they would roll 
down on the heads of the people below, only 
to be helped up again. I never saw the 
slightest sign of ill temper. They are all 
extremely polite, almost servile to Europeans, 
and I was never touched. The procession 
when it did come was extremely weird. 
Every few minutes a crowd of men from 
some particular locality would come singing 
out of the gate with huge flags, the poles 
of which were surmounted by brass devices, 
usually including the crescent and the star. 
The crowds were in no regular order, but 



34 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

all were in a perfect frenzy of excitement, 
leaping up in the air and shouting all the 
time. They only advanced very slowly 
(two or three yards a minute). Each crowd 
had, beside its flags, its band consisting of 
tom-toms and cymbals. Of course there 
was no tune but a weird sort of rhythm. 

One very old man was being led along by 
several others ; he seemed in an absolutely 
mad frenzy trying to dash off everywhere, 
but was firmly held by his friends ; then there 
was a dervish almost naked with a wild- 
looking head and glaring eyes. Some were 
twisting round and round as they went along 
the road ; others had swords and spears and 
knives of all descriptions, with which they 
cut themselves about till they streamed with 
blood; others stuck arrows right through 
their faces between their jaws, reminding one 
of the story of Elijah and the Prophets of 
Baal. 

Suddenly the crowds would form in a ring 
and all clap their hands in time with the 
tom-toms, while two dervishes would dash at 
each other with swords and shields, and you 
would just be thinking that one of them 



THE FEAST OF PURIM 35 

must be killed, when they would separate 
and stalk each other round the ring as if 
they had lost each other, striking out all the 
while at the air. Next came crowds of 
ordinary Moslems with their Turkish fezes, 
shouting continuously one meaningless refrain 
Yahamalali-yahmali " ; now and then, it 
seemed as if they were playing " oranges and 
lemons," for they would form into two long 
lines and commence clapping, all in slow 
perfect rhythm chop-chop-chop-chop. One 
or two would mount on the shoulders of 
others and be carried at a furious pace up 
and down the lines, shouting a kind of 
patriotic litany at the end of each clause, 
the rest calling out as before " Yahamalali- 
yahmali." There were a large number of 
Turkish soldiers to keep order. They used 
to fire guns in the air, but this has been 
stopped as it was very dangerous. 



THE JEWISH PASSOVER 



THE JEWISH PASSOVER 



The Monday before our Good Friday was 
the full moon and the Jewish Passover. The 
moonlight here is indescribable. The previous 
evening I walked in its light to the top of 
the Mount of Olives, where we had a glorious 
view of the Mountains of Moab from 40 to 
50 miles away, and the moon shining on the 
Dead Sea, some 30 miles off. The next 
day, having luckily an invitation, I went 

with friends to the house of Rabbi B to 

be present at the family Passover, and to a 
certain extent share the meal. The Rabbi 
was a fairly rich Jew with a large family of 
nine children, living out in one of the Jewish 
colonies. He could only speak a very few 
words of English, but one of his daughters 
had been educated in an English school 
here, and so could talk quite well. 
They were extremely kind and hospitable, 
39 



40 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

and not only gave us all food, but also every 
few minutes they stopped while the father in 
broken English, and the daughter fluently, 
entered into long explanations of each part 
and action with their significance. The 
Rabbi was delighted to know I had learnt 
Hebrew, and made a tremendous fuss, 
actually making me sit down during parts of 
the ceremony on his left hand at the table, 
whilst the rest sat on chairs at the end of 
the room watching. He kept his Hebrew 
copy of the Pentateuch for me to follow, and 
continually had the ceremony stopped to 
explain this or that. I found my idea of 
the ceremony was absolutely wrong. I had 
a sort of idea that they had a lamb roasted 
which they eat in great haste to typify the 
flight from Egypt — this is, I believe, how 
the Samaritans keep the Passover, but with 
the Jews it is entirely different. To start 
with, there is no lamb, and never has been 
since the destruction of the Temple, as it 
can only be killed in the Temple. Again, 
instead of their being in haste, it is exactly 
the reverse, they protract the meal as long 
as possible (till well on into the next morning). 



THE JEWISH PASSOVER 41 

and they are to lean back in their chairs 
while they eat, to signify first, that they are 
now in bondage to no man, but are free to 
enjoy their time, and secondly, that they do 
not rely on their own strength, but lean on 
the power of God. I stayed from 6.30 to 
11,20 p.m., and though the ceremony was 
then over, they had still to sing the whole of 
the Song of Songs. They all sat round the 
table with the father at one end and an 
empty chair at the other. This chair is for 
Elias, if he should return; the door is kept 
open for the same reason. Every member 
of the family is to have four cups of wine 
which are filled at stated times to signify the 
four promises in Exod. vi. 6, and first ten 
words of ver. 7. The four mentions of the 
word "cup" in Gen. xl. 11-14, according to 
the Rabbi, obviously refer to this service. 
It is really the first day of unleavened bread, 
thus throughout the meal we were continu- 
ously eating the unleavened cakes which look 
like shrivelled pancakes and taste like water 
lunch biscuits. The Rabbi commenced after 
the first cup of wine to explain the meaning 
of the assembly, and to give a short sermon 



42 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

which was prompted by the youngest boy 
who could talk, asking the formal question, 
" What mean these things ? " The eldest 
daughter explained in English what her 
father was saying. It was something like 
this. It is our duty at such a time to show 
kindness to strangers and not to copy the 
Egyptians, who first showed kindness to 
Joseph, and afterwards oppressed his de- 
scendants ; also we must not, like Pharaoh, 
be good to the women and harm the men, 
but show kindness to all strangers, remember- 
ing that we were once strangers in a foreign 
land. At the meal amongst other things we 
had cucumbers, the small local kind ; lettuces 
with some bitter mixture made of all sorts 
of vegetables, to typify the bricks and mortar 
which they had to make without stubble ; 
some weird kind of fishy dumplings, Turkish 
coffee, cake, tea in glasses, and with every- 
thing unleavened bread. The Rabbi showed 
me how in the Hebrew (Gen. i. 5) the first 
part of the verse shows (to him) that origin- 
ally all considered, as we do, that a day is a 
day and a night, but that for the Jews it was 
altered to a night and a day at the institution 



THE JEWISH PASSOVER 43 

of the Passover (Exod. xii. 18 ; Lev. xxiii. 5 
and 32), also he pointed out how the first 
month of the year was then changed to 
Nisan, the Passover month. 

The next morning a party of seven of us 
started at 7 a.m. for a donkey picnic to Ain 
Fara, probably the Euphrates mentioned in 
Jer. xiii. 4-- 7, passing Anathoth on the way. 
We commenced the descent from Mount 
Scopus (the northern end of the Mount of 
Olives) ; this goes gradually down for 20 
miles, and finally reaches the Jordan Valley 
4000 feet below, the roadway only a moun- 
tain track over the wild hillsides. We 
crossed several " wadies " — dry torrent beds, 
which grow deeper as they go down until 
they join together and become huge chasms. 
In one of them Ain Fara is situated ; Ain" 
means a spring. There is a fine spring there 
which never runs dry, even at the end of the 
long summer. The approach to it is very 
sudden ; after picking your way down stony 
hill slopes for two hours you come to a place 
where you can ride no more, and get off to 
clamber down the face of the rock several 
hundred feet to the little oasis at the bottom. 



44 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

I have never seen anything like the awfulness 
of the chasm ; the clififs must be about 
I GOO feet on each side, just simply bare 
rugged rocks with great caves here and 
there, where hermits used to live, and some 
of them are still used for shrines for the 
pilgrims to visit and to worship in. We 
climbed up to one of them, high up on the 
face of the precipitous cliff, and one had to 
clamber up through a tunnel in the rock to 
approach it. When we got there we found 
the old monk at home, and he showed us his 
den. It was a square room with pictures, 
candlesticks, etc., where the pilgrims wor- 
shipped, cut out of the solid rock, and next to 
it a little compartment about six feet by nine, 
where he lived himself, containing a mattress 
for a bed, a table and chair, a candlestick 
and clock, the ticking of which seemed very 
loud inside the rock room, saying in the 
words of the poet, ''never— for ever — never — 
for ever,*' etc. Beneath was a sheer drop of 
two or three hundred feet to the spring 
which we could hear babbling below. Up 
and down the valley one could see nothing 
but great rugged rocks. After lunch, a 



MAUNDY THURSDAY 45 

bathe and tea, we started for home, which 
we reached about 7.30. 

On Maundy Thursday I got up soon after 
six and started off to watch the Greek 
ceremony of the washing of the feet. 

In front of the entrance to the Church of 
the Sepulchre is a square courtyard sur- 
rounded on all four sides by high buildings. 
It is in the middle of this court that the 
service takes place. On the walls, windows, 
roofs, ledges, and down in -the courtyard 
below, there was a dense mass of people. 
Suspended in mid air were several photo* 
graphers with their big cameras on hanging 
trays, also a cinematograph operator facing 
myself, with my back against a wall. I have 
never seen such a crowd in so small an area. 
Round the space in the centre were three 
rows of Turkish soldiers to keep the people 
back, and in the middle a raised platform of 
wood on which the scene took place. For a 
little " backsheesh a soldier pushed his way 
through the crowd and brought us to a 
plank on some tubs, where we could see 
over all the crowd. We had a good while to 



46 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

wait ; some waited three and a half hours, 
but it was very interesting. At one time I 
saw a professional European pick-pocket 
being hauled off by the soldiers to the Serai. 
Then there was a Jew who had ventured 
into the courtyard, hoping to escape atten- 
tion, but having been recognized, he had to 
be \ surrounded by Moslem soldiers, or he 
would probably have been murdered by the 
Christians (Greeks). 

The service began soon after 8 a.m. A 
grand procession with candles, crosses, and 
fans issued from the church and filled the 
raised platform. The Patriarch was gorge- 
ously dressed, with a magnificently jewelled 
crown on his head. Latin prelates are 
dressed as priests ; Greek as kings (Rev. 
i. 6 ; V. lo). 

The ceremony is very fine and like an old 
Passion play, as in fact are all these cere- 
monies. Twelve archdeacons of the Greek 
Church represent the twelve Apostles, and 
while the Gospel is being read in the court- 
yard the Patriarch lays aside all his gorgeous 
robes and kingly crown, and girding himself 
with a towel, proceeds to wash each of their 



MAUNDY THURSDAY 47 

feet in turn. All the detail of the story is 
carried out, Peter refusing to have his feet 
washed, etc. Many of the tourists here look 
upon it as an awful example of mock 
humility, but it does not strike me in that 
way at all. It teaches the story in such 
a way as one can never forget, and has the 
same meaning as our Lord's action had to 
the Apostles. 

On Thursday night we had a celebration 
of the Holy Communion, and when it was 
ended we went out across the brook Kedron 
to the Garden of Gethsemane, and had a quiet 
service amongst the old olive trees. Never 
have I been at any service so impressive. 
Such an inspiration should last one's life. 
We got there early, and as I stood under the 
stars, surrounded by the old old olive trees, 
looking up to the shadow of the wall of 
Jerusalem, standing as it always has, the 
whole picture seemed so perfect that one 
might have imagined one had really gone 
back to the old time. After a few moments 
I saw a crowd of men coming along with 
lanterns and staves, and the parallel seemed 
most real. Some of these were old bearded 



48 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

Franciscans, who had come for the same 
purpose as we had. Others were from the 
American colony, and had come to sing one 
or two old hymns and pray. All seemed to 
feel the solemnity of the occasion, and there 
was a perfect silence over the whole scene. 
No one spoke above the slightest whisper. 

I have no doubt that many branches of 
Christian thought were represented there, 
and yet there was one perfect spirit of har- 
mony. First some one held up a lantern 
(just like the one in the picture of Christ 
knocking on the door), and started quietly to 
sing a hymn in English ; all who could 
joined in. Then the Franciscans chanted 
low what was apparently a short liturgy ; 
next there was a pause and some one knelt 
down ; in a moment all were on their knees 
and there was dead silence. All reserve 
left me, and I forgot all differences. Never 
shall I forget kneeling in silence by the side 
of an old grey-bearded monk. Soon after 

this our own people arrived. Canon B 

read the Gospel story, and we had one or 
two hymns and extemporary prayers. 

Good Friday was a quiet day. In the 



THE HOLY FIRE 49 

afternoon I went into the Church of the 
Holy Sepulchre, to find that it was already 
crammed with pilgrims who were sleeping in 
heaps everywhere, to keep their places for 
the services of the next two days and three 
nights. The atmosphere would have been 
unbearable if it had not been for the priests, 
who continuously sprinkled every one with 
rose water and swung their censers. In the 
Eastern ceremonies one learns to appreciate 
incense. 

The Holy Fire 

Saturday morning I went up to the con- 
sulate to join the consular party who had a 
special gallery in the church, to. see the cere- 
mony of the Holy Fire. We were eleven 
men and four ladies. The latter had to sit 
in a separate gallery as we were in a Fran- 
ciscan part of the church. We started down 
in a procession with the two consular 

kawasses " marching in front, beating on 
the ground with their staffs, which is a sign 
that all must make way. We pushed 
through the enormous crowd in the church 
cpurtyard, and went up through a monastery, 



so ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

and finally found ourselves in a gallery of , 
the church high up above the masses below. 
Every part of the church was crammed to 
suffocation, and down below round the 
Sepulchre the pilgrims were so thick that I 
frequently saw people moving about on the 
heads of others. They sometimes stand • 
three deep, one over the other against a 
wall. A narrow path was kept round the 
actual Sepulchre by rows of Turkish soldiers. 
The noise at times was tremendous, the 
priests shouting at each other and the 
pilgrims continually singing, "We are glad 
we are Christians ; may the Jews go to hell/* 
I saw two Jews from the House of Industry 
unrecognized in the crowd. The soldiers 
treated the people just like sacks, and threw 
them about wherever they wanted them, but 
I never saw one lose his temper. Every 
one had in his hand bundles of candles wait- 
ing to light them at the holy fire. After 
a long while the procession came through 
the Greek Catholicon, and wound its way 
three times round the Sepulchre by the path 
made by the soldiers. The Patriarch as 
usual was dressed in gorgeous robes and 



THE HOLY FIRE 51 




Fig. I. 



PART OF THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE. 

A. The Greek Catholicon or Cathedral. 

B. Rotunda in which the Sepulchre is situated. 

C. Angel Chapel kt entrance. 

D. Actual Sepulchre, a room built in the^ centre of the 

Church. 
EE. Holes for the fire. 
F. English Consular gallery. 



52 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

wore a crown. Then he went alone into the 
Sepulchre, and a stillness of expectation 
ensued. 

I should say that all this time there is no 
light in any of the Greek churches, but all 
are waiting for the light to come from the 
Sepulchre to light tham for another year. 

Suddenly the Patriarch pushes a light out 
of each of the holes and a fearful state of 
confusion ensues; every one is fighting for 
the light, way is made for the special runners 
to dash off at full speed to the men on 
horseback outside, who ride furiously to 
Bethlehem, Nazareth, etc., and even to Jaffa, 
where there are special steamers to carry it 
on to Constantinople, Egypt, etc. In less 
than one minute the whole church is one 
blaze of light, every one has a bunch of 
from twenty to thirty candles blazing away, 
and bundles are being handed up by strings 
into all the galleries, the place is filled with 
smoke, and you can well imagine you are in 
a burning church. It is a stupendous scene. 
The pilgrims believe that this fire will not 
hurt them, and it seems as if it is so, for you 
see them passing the flames of their candles 



THE HOLY FIRE 53. 

all over their faces and washing their hands 
in it. It is said that they believe it is 
miraculously sent down from Heaven, but 
apart from this deception I think the idea is 
very fine — the Light of Life coming from 
the tomb and spreading from church to 
church throughout the world. When once 
you get accustomed to the confusion which 
always attends these services, you see that 
the underlying idea is usually very fine. 

We came out at 2 p.m. after having been 
in four hours. In the evening (Saturday) 
I went down with several others from the 
hotel to see the Abyssinian service. This 
is a very primitive and small church dating 
direct from Apostolic times; they have lived 
alone in the mountains of Abyssinia and not 
been affected by all the influences at work 
in the other Churches. (Every sect and 
Church seems to have its representatives 
here.) Their service was held on the roof 
of the chapel of St. Helena, which is part of 
the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. They 
had erected a small tent, and when we arrived 
the service was in full swing. Outside were 
two men with gorgeous umbrellas, and men 



54 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

beating tom-toms just at the entrance to the 
tent. Inside we could just see the Bishop 
and priests — all black men— dressed in the 
most varied and bright colours, chanting and 
swaying their bodies to and fro. All round 
was a crowd of amused sightseers waiting 
for the procession to come out. The whole 
scene reminded me exactly of a country fair. 
After some time the procession was formed, 
and umbrellas, tom-toms, Bishop and priests 
lurched round the roof, leaning first on one 
side and then on the other, all the time 
chanting a weird dirge to the time of the 
tom-toms ; thus they went three times round, 
the idea being that they had found out the 
Body of Christ was not in the Sepulchre, 
and were searching everywhere to find out 
where it was laid. When they went back 
into the tent I came away, and went with 

the Rev. H to call on a man named 

Themelis, a diaconus. He is a fairly young 
man but of great importance, as he had been 
sent over to England by the Patriarch that 
he might learn English and attend an 
English clergy training college, in order to 
assist the Patriarch in his dealings with the 



EASTER 55 

English Church. Mn H — — had been his 
tutor. This diaconus Themelis took us into 
the Patriarch's apartmexits, and we, with the 
Russian Consul and his wife, proceeded 
behind the Patriarch back into the Church 
of the Sepulchre for the grand Easter 
Mass, which takes place at midnight at the 
entrance into the Sepulchre. The church 
was still crowded as it had been since 
Thursday midday, or for sixty hours, but we 
being in the procession had way made for 
us, and we were placed by the side of the 
Patriarch's chair facing straight into the 
Sepulchre (see Y in diagram). I stood on 

the right hand and Mr. H on the 

left, each holding enormous candles, which 
Themelis had given us. We looked straight 
down the avenue. In every direction we 
could see throngs of people right up to the 
r06f all holding candles. My overcoat 
seemed out of place in such a gorgeous 
assembly, especially after I had found that 
the candle-grease had run down the front. 
Perhaps I ought to have turned it inside 
out. I wished that I had my B.A. hood 
with me. 



56 ROUND *ABOUT JERUSALEM 

At midnight the climax of the service was 
reached. The Patriarch walked slowly into 
the Sepulchre. There was a hush all over the 
crowd. ' A moment later he re-appeared, and, 
turning to the people, shouted, XptVro? avia-rr}, 
" Christ is risen." At once every one took 
up the cry, "He is risen indeed." There 
was a sudden wave of enthusiasm over the 
whole church, the candles were waved in 
the air, the banners were twisted round and 
round, and the bells in the belfry were set 
clashing. Some time after this I got 
Themelis to get me out, as I was dead tired, 
having been there eight hours, four in the 
morning and four in the evening. He gave 
me my candle to keep as a memento, but 
though I burnt a good lot of it, it is still too 
big to get into my trunk. 

On Easter afternoon I went down to 
what is called the Garden Tomb (the rock 
tomb out in the country supposed by Euro- 
peans to be the real tomb of Christ). Here 
there were only two or three Europeans, 
such a contrast to the scene the night before. 

About Good Friday and Easter | Day 
services I ought to explain that somehow, I 



EASTER 57 

don't understand how, the offices for the 
various days have got pushed back in time 
until now, in the majority of churches, they 
are some twelve hours early, and in some 
cases much more, leading to the ridiculous 
result that Matins is always said at night, 
and Evensong, or what they call it, is said 
in the morning. In some churches they 
seem to get the time of day correct by 
fixing the offices still earlier, and being a 
whole day too soon. Of course, at the 
Church of the Sepulchre the services, especi- 
ally in Passion Week, follow on one after 
the other, and have to be fitted in as best 
they can. The result is that the Thursday 
and the Saturday evenings have the real 
Friday and Sunday services. As far as the 
Latins are concerned they have no very 
striking ceremonies. They are Western, and 
though they have a great deal of ritual it 
all appears to go in the form of adoration, 
whereas the Easterns seem to think more 
of picturesque and parabolic actions. Their 
festivals take the form of enacting the 
stories which they wish to commemorate. 
The Latins, as also the other sects, have 

E 



58 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

their own ceremony of the " washing of the 
feet," but it is in a much more quiet and 
insignificant way. The Greek Church is 
the home Church of this country, and the 
Latins are looked upon as intruders, as in 
our own country. As far as the Holy 
Fire" is concerned, they shared this with 
the Greeks at one time, but they now de- 
nounce the miracle as a fraud. It seems 
that the Russian pilgrims are the only ones 
who consider it miraculous, and by no means 
all of them do. When the Easterns have 
any cause for jollification, they certainly 
know how to enter into the spirit of it. 
They don't spend a fortnight and a mint of 
money putting up miles of bunting, and then 
go and stand solemnly for hours to see a 
staid procession drag past. With them 
there would be a natural and emotional 
difference between a coronation and a funeral, 
whilst with us the chief difference seems the 
colour of the bunting. It is most amusing 
to see the Europeans looking on at all these 
scenes and pitying the maniacs who take 
part in them, when, as a matter of fact, it is 
we, I suppose, who are to be pitied, being 



EASTER 59 

so civilized that we cannot appreciate the 
real art of nature when we see it. 

After all the ceremonies are' over — 
I was eight hours at the church — I feel 
quite worn out, but am very glad not to 
have missed anything I saw. One feels 
immensely impressed by these Eastern 
services, and the impossibility of giving any 
idea of their beauty on the one hand, and of 
their absolute difference from our own ideas 
on the other. I must say that as far as I am 
concerned, I was there long enough to feel 
in sympathy with these Eastern people. I 
didn't mind the enormous crowd. It was 
inspiring ; so far from feeling any objection 
to the masses of peasants living, eating, and 
sleeping in the church from Thursday mid- 
day to Sunday, I felt it quite a privilege to 
be in such a throng of simple, childlike 
people, who, if they are misguided, show 
such earnestness and zeal as I have never 
seen anywhere else. I learnt to appreciate 
the Greek services ; their ceremonial, natur- 
ally Eastern and gorgeous, is simple and 
primitive, so that I, who could not under- 
stand the words, could thoroughly enter into 



6o ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

the spirit of the services. They have an 
inspiring wealth of meaning not to be 
imagined without seeing it. 

On Easter Monday the first of a series 
of football matches was played between a 
team sent over from the Beyrout Syrian 
Protestant College and four teams : Monday, 
C.M.S. and L.J.S. combined; Tuesday, 
Y.M.C.A. ; Wednesday, St. George s 
(Bishop's School) ; Thursday, all Jerusalem. 
The whole visit was very well conducted, 
and they have never had anything like it 
before. A large marquee was put up, and 
each day all societies met on the field — the 
mayor, consuls, etc. ; the crowd numbered 
about 5000. 

On Tuesday at 8 a.m. our party assembled 
to start on the Jericho tour. Mr. H — 
who is an expert at this sort of thing, had 
made all the arrangements ; we could not 
possibly have had a better guide ; he knew 
not only all the country well, but also most 
of the Bedouin, so that we did not require 
an escort. There were four ladies, all full 

of fun and extremely energetic; R- of 

the C.M.S. and myself, nine boys and a 



JERICHO 6i 

pupil teacher and five Arabs — twenty-two in 
all. We had twenty-one donkeys and a 
mule, but two of them were used exclusively 
as pack animals, so the boys took it in turns 
to walk. You can imagine what fun we had 
making the donkeys go. Jericho is five 
hours distant from here, and over 3500 feet 
below (about the height of Snowdon). We 
crossed the Kedron Valley and over the 
slope of the Mount of Olives to Bethany, 
and then began to descend. The road here 
is very steep and simply winds backwards 
and forwards down the hillside to the 
Apostles' Fountain, which is traditionally the 
resting-place of the Apostles, and then 
slowly descends for several miles along 
barren, dry valleys, till after a short rise you 
reach the inn of the Good Samaritan. I 
cannot remember seeing a tree between 
Bethany and the plain of Jericho ; nothing 
but stones, rock, and burnt-up grass. 

We did not stop at this inn, but just 
looked inside, and went on down, down, 
down for two or three more miles to the 
next khan (inn) ; here we had our first 
meal These khans " are simply native 



62 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 



houses with enclosures where you can get 
rest and shade for yourselves and animals 
and water, or, if you prefer it, Turkish 
coffee. After about two hours' rest we 
continued down the valleys, which became 
more barren and rocky as we descended. 
This one is called the Valley of Blood. It 
always has been the haunt of robbers, and is 
traditionally connected with the story of the 
Good Samaritan. It has been the scene of 
several murders quite recently. A few years 
ago a lady and a doctor, living here now, 
were robbed, and the doctor only just 
escaped with his life. Curiously enough, 
though they will rob any one, yet a woman 
is much safer than a man. They will never 
touch a woman, but will shoot or strike a 
man without the least hesitation. The doctor 
had his collar-bone broken, and only re- 
covered consciousness to find himself being 
dragged from the road to a precipice. They 
left him when he fired a revolver which he 
had concealed in his pocket. A little further 
on we rounded a hill, and Jericho appeared 
directly below us. We descended the last 
few hundred feet extremely abruptly down a 



JERICHO 63 

zigzag road, and at the foot of the cliffs 
found ourselves within a mile of New 
Jericho. Looking back, the glaring white 
stony cliffs look insurmountable. The plain 
itself appears absolutely level, and is here 
twelve miles broad, and stretches north as 
far as the eye can see; on the west the 
cliffs of Judaea ; on the east the equally 
abrupt mountains of Moab, Nebo, Pisgah, 
etc. It is absolutely barren except for desert 
scrub, but is capable of luxuriant vegetation 
when properly irrigated, as is shown by the 
large tract round Jericho, where they only 
seem to have to scratch the land to produce 
prolific crops. The fearful heat enables 
them to grow all the most tropical plants 
with ease, bananas, etc. Everything there 
is greatly in advance of the crops by 
Jerusalem, and they can easily get more 
than one harvest a year. We turned first 
to the left, and, as the afternoon wore on, 
rode up in a cavalcade to the ruins of Old 
Jericho, without any possible doubt the site 
of the city taken by Joshua. It looks as 
you approach like one huge mole-hill of 
brown dust without one blade of grass upon 



64 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

it, surrounded by luxuriant fields of corn, 
palms, etc. The solitude and desolation of 
the ruins, surrounded by such vegetation, is 
very striking ; it seems to be absolutely un- 
inhabited by man, bird, or beast. The size 
of the city is very noticeable. It seems not 
much larger than Trafalgar Square. Like 
all the old towns, it was evidently one 
honeycomb of rooms all thrown together, 
with no attempt at order, and communicating 
with each other by a perfect maze of narrow 
paths. The houses were built of bricks 
made of mud and straw, and baked in the 
sun, such as the houses of New Jericho are 
built of. I stood for a time and watched 
some of them being made. The explorers 
have been at work here and have laid bare 
the foundation of the wall which was over- 
thrown in the time of Joshua. This extends 
all round the city, which is shaped like an 
egg. The wall in section wa^ like this : 




JERICHO 65 

the foundation bulging out for better sup- 
port. All is of stone, some stones being 
six feet long but very loosely put together, 
and packed in with smaller ones. The wall 
proper (upper part) is now simply a confused 
mass filling up the outer trench, and from 
all sides you can, as we did, go up into the 
city every man straight before him (Josh, 
vi. 20). As for the number of people being 
in what seems so small a place, there are 
several things to be remembered. It is as 
large as all the old cities of its time here ; 
people in the East can and do now live 
huddled together like a swarm of bees. The 
perfectness of the climate down there would 
make it entirely unnecessary for them to 
live in houses, but they would need a citadel 
in case of attack. On the other hand, it is 
quite easy to understand how the Israelites 
could easily walk seven times round and yet 
have plenty of energy left. It must have 
been very terrifying to the defenders to see 
the tribe from the desert parading round 
and round the city in absolute silence. Also 
the Israelites must have known well where 
Rahab lived, as they would have passed by 



66 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

thirteen times. As one stands on the ruined 
city and looks back across the mile of level 
plain to the great rock cliff of the Judsean 
hills, broken here and there by huge clefts, 
chasms, and caves, you can almost see those 
two spies slinking off from the wall in the 
exactly opposite direction from their camp 
to hide for three days till the plain on the 
other side was clear for them to return. 
Josh. ii. 1 6 says ''the mountain." Just 
opposite Old Jericho the cliff towers up to 
one great peak called Quarantania, tradition- 
ally the desert and mountain of the Tempta- 
tion of Christ. It is honey-combed with 
hermits' caves, and surmounted by a monas- 
tery. The reason why Jericho was built in 
the plain is perfectly clear ; inside the outer 
wall of the city bubbles up a never-failing 
and plentiful supply of fresh and sw^eet 
water, so plentiful is it that only a part of 
the stream has to be diverted to turn a 
water mill. It fills two large tanks so deep 
that I did not touch the bottom, though I 
dived from a height of 15 feet ; you can 
imagine how refreshing a good swim in this 
was after a hot and dusty ride. The spring 



JERICHO 67 

itself supplies New Jericho with its water, 
some two miles away. It is also of Biblical 
interest. The incident recorded in 2 Kings 
ii. 19-22 took place here. 

After a good swim we all rode off to New 
Jericho, which is simply a collection of sun- 
dried, mud-brick houses, and two or three 
hotels. We had obtained permission to use 
the hall of the house of a fairly rich native, 
who was away for the time being ; here we 
fed and slept in rows on the stone floor. 
The next day we got up early and started 
off in a cavalcade across the plain of the 
Jordan. For an hour and a half we rode 
over the dry sand with nothing on either 
side but scrub. All this land would be as 
fertile as the part round Jericho if it were 
properly irrigated, but it belongs to the 
Sultan, who does not let any one do it. The 
Jordan has evidently sunk, as there are 
slight descents before one gets to it ; when 
you do, you find it lined on both sides with 
very dense jungle, too thick to penetrate 
except in the part cleared for the pilgrims. 
The heat each day was tremendous, and we 
were delighted to reach the shady and 



68 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

cool-looking river. Two things strike one 
— its size, it being only about 20 to 25 
yards across, though running very swiftly, 
and its mud banks, and bottom like Breydon 
Water, all soft mud. This with sand floats 
down and makes the water look like pea- 
soup. It is good to drink, but you must 
let all the grit sink, or you would be nearly 
choked. We much enjoyed a row on the 
river and a jolly good swim in it. Even 
while we were there a good number of 
Russian pilgrims came to baptize themselves 
in the water. They buy sheets of the size 
of the stone of anointing in the Church of 
the Sepulchre, and having stripped, men and 
women all together, they cover themselves 
with these sheets and jump into the river. 
These they take home to Russia to be 
buried in. On a certain day before Easter 
they go down literally by thousands, and all 
jump in together as a priest dips a cross into 
the water. 

After a lovely lunch in the jungle by the 
riverside, where are all sorts of wild animals, 
wolves, bears, boars, etc., we remounted and 
went for another hour and a half across the 



JERICHO 



69 



plain down to the north end of the Dead Sea. 
We did not actually pass any of the slime 
pits mentioned in Genesis, though of course 
they are still there, but we did have to ford 
two kinds of marshes where carriages often 
sink right in and sometimes horses are lost. 
The shore of the Dead Sea is a fine pebbly 
beach, and when we reached it there was a 



A^^cf ft ^^^^^^^^^A il Neho 
O/ives '^^ — — ' 

beautiful calm, the waves scarcely turning 
over on the shore. The big bay at the 
north end, in the centre of which we were, 
is about 12 miles across. To the east 
above the Moab cliffs we could see Nebo, 
where Moses saw the completion of his 
work, and to the west the Mount of Olives, 
where Christ Himself saw the completion 



Jer/cno 




hills 



of His. 



7.0 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

As you gaze south you cannot see the 
other end, so it looks like a great gulf. As 
soon as we were cool enough we went for a 
bathe. Can you imagine it ? Beautifully 
warm, almost dead calm, absolutely pure 
from anything growing on the bottom, float- 
ing in it or swimming, no current, and simply 
to sit in it, your head out, your hands out, 
and your feet out. You can stay in for 
hours without a chance of feeling cold, you 
can paddle out to sea for any distance and 
simply rest when you feel tired ; you have 
only just to come out on the warm beach for 
the sun to dry you, and then go in again — in 
fact, you feel just like a human swan. But 
woe betide any one who gets a drop in his 
eye or in his mouth, or in a cut ; it is five 
times as salt as the sea, and is as bitter as 
copper soaked in vinegar. 

When at last we did come finally out of 
the water we found there is one drawback ; 
you can't get the salt off your skin, or out of 
your hair. You feel somewhat like what a 
fly must after it has come out of the treacle ; 
all your clothes stick, and your hair is in 
twirly cakes. 



JERICHO 71 

After this Mr. H took R and me 

over to call on some natives whom he knew. 
They were sitting round their fire when we 
arrived, but at once set to work to make 
a beautiful kind of bread-cake — they pushed 
it into the ashes under the fire— and also 
made some Turkish coffee. In a few 
moments our meal was ready, the ashes 
were raked off, the cake was beaten to get 
off the dust, and then we all sat round and 
enjoyed it. Whilst Mr. H— — did all the 
chatting I passed round some cigarettes, 
which were much appreciated. We then 
went on to see the place where in the storms 
the sea washes over into a kind of natural 
trough ; here men dive for salt, which settles 
in large quantities at the bottom. By this 
time it was quite dark, and we walked back 
to our camp along the beach. We gathered 
a lot of dry sticks, and after a good meal set 
light to our bonfire, wrapped ourselves up in 
rugs, and lay in a circle round the fire. I 
shall never forget that night on the shore of 
the Dead Sea. It almost seemed like 
wasted time to go to sleep. However, the 
lapping of the water, the warmth and the 



72 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

rhythmic chorus of snores was too much for 
me, and I did not wake up till the sun was 
just tinging the Mountains of Moab with 
pink. 

I piled some more fuel on the bonfire, 
which was still smouldering, and a short 
time afterwards we went for another bathe. 
The morning air was cold, but the water had 
not lost its heat, and felt like a warm bath. 
We all just lay in the sea and paddled about. 
The sensation was unique lying still right 
out at sea, without a breath of air or a 
ripple, with the great mountains on each 
side, and their reflections in the water. 

We rode back to Jericho over the scorch- 
ing plain, about two and a half hours, and 
had another swim in Elisha s Fountain, and 
got rid of the coating of salt from the Dead 
Sea. We slept that night again in the native 
house in rows on the floor. Of course the 
evenings closed in with the usual camp sing- 
songs, which took the form of songs, hymns, 
and choruses. 

On Friday we set off early for a stream 
called the Aujeh, v/hich flows out of the 
Judaean hills to the Jordan, about four hours 



JERICHO 73 

north ; we passed through Old Jericho again, 
and on through the most desolate desert 
under the Cliff of Temptation, past several 
Bedouin encampments. These Bedouin of 
the valley are quite black from the sun, and 
one can easily understand their chief being 
called The Raven " and themselves " The 
Ravens" (Judg. vii. 25 ; i Kings xvii. 6). 

We also passed a desert graveyard. 
This is a very sacred place for the Bedouin, 
so sacred that they store their grain and 
property in pits dug amongst the graves, and 
leave it, no one daring to steal that which is 

guarded by the dead. Mr. H said I 

could have left my hat on one of these 
graves, and if it had not blown away, I 
should have found it there any time I came 
back to look for it. The stream was simply 
a mountain torrent, but full of fish, of which 
we caught a very large number. 

We rode back in the evening and saw 
some fine bubbling springs in the mountain- 
side, and a very fine Roman aqueduct at 
Ain Duk. 

The next morning on our journey home 
we crossed to the foot of the Judaean hills, 

F 



74 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

and then abruptly commenced the ascent. 
After mounting some way we again de- 
scended down the face of a precipice along 
a narrow track into a glorious chasm through 
which rushes a mountain stream down to the 
Jordan— Wady Kelt, the brook Cherith 
(i Kings xvii.), where Elijah was fed by 
ravens. Halfway down a monastery stands 
out from the face of the precipice. The 
scene was simply grand. The huge rock 
cliffs, towering up on both sides, full of caves 
and hermits' dens, in one of which no doubt 
Elisha lived, and down in the gorge beneath 
the rushing water, almost hidden by the 
luxuriant tangle of jungle. We went into 
the monastery, had two bathes in the water- 
falls, a good picnic lunch and tea, and started 
on our way again about 4 p.m. We returned 
along the road we had come by, up the 
" Pass of Blood," the scene of several recent 
attacks and the traditional scene of the Good 
Samaritan incident, and reached home in the 
dark about 9.30 p.m., having had a wonderful 
experience down in the Jericho Valley. 

On Monday, April 23rd, Messrs. W. R 

and I rode over on horses to Ramulla, ^ 



A NATIVE WEDDING 75 

Christian village like Bethlehem, some ten 
miles north on the road to Bethel, Samaria, 
and Galilee. We took our lunch with us, 
and put up at the house of some honorary 
C.M.S. missionaries, a mother and daughter. 
We afterwards called on a young Syrian 
who is studying here, and were taken into 
the guest-room of the family of Hadad. 
Hadad [lived some hundreds of years ago 
and his family is fairly numerous by now — 
in fact, the town is shared between four 
families. 

There was a wedding on in the place and 
this was the second day ; all the men of the 
family were assembled in the guest-room 
for the feed, and were squatting all round the 
room. Strangers, and especially foreigners, 
are very cordially welcomed at these gather- 
ings, and we were put in the place of honour 
at the side of the sheik (head of the family). 
Water was brought for us, and, like the 
rest, we commenced to wait. They had 
apparently been there some time when we 
arrived, but as, after an hour, there was still 
no sign of the meal, we humbly apologized 
through our friend, and left them still 



76 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

waiting quite contentedly for their feast. We 
hurried down through the village to the 
house of the bride, where the cooking opera- 
tions were still in progress, paid a rapid call 
on some American Quaker missionaries, re- 
turned for tea to the C.M.S. house, and 
rode home. The wedding ceremony re- 
minded me of Samson (Judg. xiv. lo). From 
the gossip that went on the bridegroom 
might have been propounding riddles all the 
time. 

On Friday I was called at 6 a.m. and 
went down to join a party Mr. H — - — was 
taking over to the Cave of Adullam; we 
were one lady, four gentlemen, two Arabs, 
and seven donkeys. We passed through 
Bethlehem, about six miles, to the Frank 
Mountain, about five miles further. This is 
the highest hill in the neighbourhood, and has 
a rampart of some 1 50 feet erected on the top 
of it. It lopks like a volcano cone. Below 
are the ruins of a tower and dungeons in the 
citadel, all built by Herod. It was the last 
standing-place of the Crusaders in Southern 
Palestine. From here we went on, mostly 
leading our donkeys over the rough and, in 



THE CAVE OF ADULLAM 77 

places, slippery rocks, across a deep wady 
to the cliff face in which is situated the 
entrance to the Cave of Adullam. We had 
lunch and a half-hour s rest in the shade of 
the rock, and then began to pack up food, 
candles, etc., fill water-bottles, take off coats 
and collars in preparation for our journey 
into the mountain. We also procured some 
camel-hair tent ropes. From the prepara- 
tions made we might have been going on 
a journey of exploration ; however, every- 
thing was needed. We then scrambled up 
the cliff to a narrow ledge, along which we 
had to proceed with great caution, at times 
on hands and knees, then, from the end of 
one buttress, we had to step across a yard 
of space into a small smooth hole in the 
cliff. One person standing at the entrance 
entirely blocked up the whole cave. Some 
Bedouin followed us thus far, but they dare 
not go farther owing to the dark. One 
cannot well imagine a more inaccessible 
place for an enemy. Being near Bethlehem, 
David would have known it. After going 
down a narrow passage for some way we 
came into a magnificent cathedral-like cave, 



78 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

which we lit up by magnesium wire. From 
here we went round a buttress into a similar 
narrow passage. We left coats, collars, and 
all extra clothing. Soon this passage became 
low, and we had to crawl on hands and 
knees. This went on for some way, and we 
were glad when it became large enough to 
rest and have some refreshment. From 
here a great many passages led off in all 
directions. We started down one and soon 
found it too low for hands and knees, we 
had simply to crawl ; from time to time we 
would drop down several feet into large 
caverns. We laughed a good deal about 
the difficulties, but were informed it was 
nothing to what was to come, which was 
true. At the next halt we were told to put 
out all candles but one. Each blew at his 
light, but luckily one did not go out, for 
the next moment we found that all matches 
had been left in our coats near the entrance. 

We relit, and Mr. H went back, but it 

was a very near escape. When he returned 
we started on again. My word! rabbit 
holes are not in it with that cave. For 
some way you would have to get your feet 



THE CAVE OF ADULLAM 79 

in different cracks, then lie on your left 
shoulder and squirm, then come to a drop 
which you would have to take head first; 
then there was a clean drop of 25 feet, 
which you had to do on the rope ; finally, 
we came out at the same hole we had gone 
in by nearly three hours before. We had 
some tea and rode home, arriving at 9 p*m. 
Though we had been exploring all this time 
we had only done one of the nine passages 

in the cave that Mr. H ■ knows. When 

you see the size of these places you have 
no difficulty in understanding how Saul and 
David could have been in the same cave 
together, or how David could have lodged 
his 400 men, or how Obadiah hid men " by 
fifty in a cave." You could have put 1000 
men into that one, and have lost them all. 
We got back to find that two English 
clergymen had got out of the train at 
**Bittir'* to walk the last 10 miles into the 
Holy City, and had not turned up. A small 
search party had gone out to find them. 
However, in the morning, as they were still 
lost, I went to the English Consulate. The 
consul sent to the Serai (Turkish Magistrate's 



8o ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

Office) and a mounted police force was 
sent, then I started in a carriage with 

R towards Ain Kharim. We had got 

a good way along the road when we were 
stopped by a breathless horseman who told 
us that they had calmly walked in, quite un- 
conscious of the trouble they had caused ; 
they had lost themselves and been put up at 
a convent. 



SAMARIA AND THE 
SAMARITAN PASSOVER 



SAMARIA AND THE SAMARITAN 
PASSOVER 

Having been told that I was certainly not 
to miss the Samaritan Passover, especially 
as only very few have seen it, I joined a 
party of seven who were to drive half-way 
(40 miles in all) and then ride the other half. 
We drove through the land of Benjamin, 
which is all rocky and mostly treeless, into 
the beautiful valleys of Ephraim, where the 
road winds along between the mountains 
which are covered with beautiful olive 
groves and vineyards. The wild flowers 
were simply wonderful. The walls were 
covered with honeysuckle and maidenhair. 
In one place we saw a perfect field of irises 
growing thick like corn. When we reached 
Singyl (a corruption of Saint Giles, a 
Crusading knight) we were met by the 
horses for the party which had been sent 
out to meet us from Nablus. We walked 

83 



84 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

over the hills to the east towards Shiloh, 
which is about 2| miles from the road, so 
that few travellers except camping parties 
see it. 

It is simply like all these old cities, a 
small rounded knoll, steep on all sides. It 
is entirely a ruin, no one lives there, but it 
is covered with the foundations of buildings ; 
here we looked up all the references to 
Shiloh we could find. Eli lived here ; and 
here Samuel heard the call. The Benjamites 
stole their wives from here (Judg. xxi. 2 1-23). 
After seeing and climbing over the heap 
of ruins one can understand the force of 
the words of Jer. vii. 12-14 ^.nd xxvi. 6. 

I then rode one of the horses back to the 
road and drove on to Nablus. This is a 
very fanatical Moslem town and quite a 
large place, about 12,000. No European 
can walk about alone, and even as I drove 
in, many boys picked up stones to throw at 
the carriage. I stayed with Dr. and Mrs. 
W — — , who really were most kind, and 
gave me a very jolly time, though they 
themselves were extremely busy. Nablus 
is the old city of Shechem, and is situated 



SAMARIA 85 

in a deep valley between the great moun- 
tains of Ebal and Gerizim. As you turn 
westward you pass between two great 
shoulders of the mountains, where no doubt 
took place the cursing and the blessing 
(Deut. xxvii. i-end and Josh. viii. 35). 
Then, as you go on into the town, you can 
see standing out from Gerizim and entirely 
overlooking the city, a great pulpit-like rock, 
on which Jotham could stand with perfect 
safety and shout his insulting parable at 
the men of Shechem. Looking up at the 
mountains above, one could easily picture 
Judg. ix. 35 (Gaal and Zebul). On 
Sunday I attended the Arabic church, and 
the next day joined a party in a drive to 
Sebaste, the old Samaria. We drove a 
distance of about two hours (everything is 
reckoned in hours here). The valley down 
which we went is well watered, very beautiful, 
fertile, broad and green. Samaria stood 
on a very lofty circular hill, which stands 
quite alone, having a broad deep valley all 
round. The view from the top is grand, 
but is not so extensive as that from Ebal. 
During the last three years the excavators 



86 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

have been at work here, and have brought 
to light some wonderful ruins, some of which 
could only be indistinctly traced before. 

As we climbed up the steep side of the 
hill we reached what is called The Leper's 
Gate." Till three years ago the spot was 
only called this in local tradition, being, as 
with the rest of the ruins it was, under a 
ploughed field ; now it has been dug out and 
stands there almost complete, but looks as 
if it were not quite finished building. There 
are huge massive bastions of the old city 
wall and the gate between. The door itself 
is of course gone, but you can distinctly see 
the sockets in which it stood. From this 
place one gets a fine view straight down 
into the broad valley below where the 
Syrians encamped. Here, where those 
hungry lepers sat and made up their minds 
to go down into the enemies* camp below 
and risk their lives for food, we sat and ate 
lunch. It is wonderful how much more real 
these stories become when you see the places 
where they were enacted. From here we 
climbed up through the city — that is, we 
walked through the ploughed fields which 



SAMARIA 87 

cover it. A wonderful fulfilment of Micah's 
prophecy (i. 6). It seems as if the excavators 
are fulfilling the end of the verse. 

We passed through the colonnade which 
surrounds the citadel, a grand circular avenue 
of pillars two miles long, each pillar being 
about 20 feet high, though many are now 
broken. This was built by Herod, who 
beautified and rebuilt Samaria. At the top 
they have laid bare a magnificent flight of 
steps, which led up to Herod's Palace, and 
the temple he built for the worship of Ceesar 
Augustus. There is a headless statue of 
Caesar and the foundation ruins of the 
Palace of Ahab, and also that of Omri. 
They have found here pieces of pottery 
used as slates, on which were written corn 
bills, etc., mentioning the name of King 
Ahab. 

There is still a^ village here called 
Sebastiyeh, where we were entertained 
royally in the guest-room with coffee, tea, 
etc. They would have been insulted if we 
had suggested paying. ' 

On the Tuesday morning I got a native 
boy to go with me oyer to Jacob's Well, but 



88 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

as he could speak no English, and I could 
only say a string of words and phrases in 
Arabic, we could not talk much, but had to 
do everything by signs. The well is situated 
just where the Nablus valley runs into 
another, and is now unfortunately surrounded 
by the foundations of a new Greek Church, 
which is being built over it as a sacred spot. 
There had been an old Crusader church here. 

I t is directly at the foot of Mount Gerizim. 
One can easily imagine the woman pointing 
up, and saying, Our fathers worshipped in 
this mountain.'' From it there extends a 
fine plain, which is simply one sheet of corn 
unbroken by road, rock, or fence. No doubt 
the words of John iv. 31-38 were suggested 
to the mind of our Lord as He sat here and 
looked over this wide field. There is a 
narrow path winding across the valley, and 
I could see a little company of villagers in 
the distance coming along in single file 
through the corn. The man in charge was 
a Greek monk ; he seemed very nice, and 
drew me up some water in a can (the 
water now is 32 metres belov/ the top of the 
well), and let down a can of burning candles 



THE SAMARITAN PASSOVER 89 



for me to see the interior. The water was 
beautiful and cool. I thought I would try 
some Greek on him, and so asked for a 
/3i^Xo9, and he gave me one ; I then to his 
surprise turned to John iv. and read with 
him in the Greek the story. When we got to 
verse 13 I drank from the water, and said, 
Sixp-qo-co ttoXlv (*' I shall thirst again) " ; he 
smiled, and turned back to the book, and 
pointing with his finger to verse 14, read it 
over. It was fearfully hot walking back, 
and I had to stop several times under the 
shade of the olive trees. 

The chief reason for my visit was to be 
present at the Samaritans' celebration of the 
Passover (see 2 Kings xvii. 24-end ; Ezra 
iv. 1-2 ; and Nehemiah). 

We started up Mount Gerizim about 4 
p.m. and found it a fairly steep climb to the 
top ; however, we reached the summit before 
sunset with the hope of obtaining a good 
view, but unfortunately the sun was obscured 
by drifting clouds and it was too dark for 
a photo. The Samaritans, a small and 
rapidly dying-out community, who usually 

G 



90 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

live in a quarter of Nablus, were encamped 
in tents for their Passover week on the top 
of the mountain. When we arrived they 
were just about to commence the ceremony, 
which fhey begin at sunset except when the 
next day happens to be a Sabbath. The 
women and children were in the tents. They 
do not share in the ceremony till the men 
have finished, then portions are brought to 
them. 

On the top of the mountain there is a pit 
about ID feet deep and 4 feet wide lined 
with stone like a well. At the bottom of 
this was a roaring fire, into which they kept 
dropping branches of trees till the flames 
(no smoke) poured out into the air above. 
At the side was a trench also full of fire 
heating two large cauldrons. It was round 
these fires that the 'men were standing when 
we arrived. All were dressed in long, flow- 
ing white garments. Inside the circle were 
six lambs, one for each family— over these 
the high priest stood with hands out- 
stretched to heaven, calling for God's bless- 
ing on their sacrifice and reminding the men 
of their deliverance from bondage. After a 



THE SAMARITAN PASSOVER 91 

short, wild kind of litany, the men drew out 
their knives and with a great flourish and 
shout cut the throats of the lambs. They 
were dead in an instant. " He was led as 
a Iamb to the slaughter." One could not 
help thinking of this when one saw the 
lambs waiting, without a sound, for death. 
Boiling water was poured over them and all 
the wool plucked off. The entrails were cut 
out, and the right shoulders cut off as a wave 
offering to God, and to be a portion for the 
high priest and his family. Not a bone 
must be broken, but the flesh is slit at the 
sides with a knife. No stranger must touch. 
The lambs are then crucified on rough 
wooden crosses, head downwards, with the 
hind legs on the arms of the crosses. Salt 
is rubbed in. When all was ready the men 
stood in a circle round the pit holding the 
six crosses to conclude the sacrifice. The 
scene was such as I never can possibly 
forget. The white-robed figures silhouetted 
against the sky, some with their hands 
smeared with blood lifted up to heaven, 
others holding up the sacrifices, round the 
pit of fire on that barren rocky mountain-top 



92 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

— the clouds drifting past, giving an occa- 
sional glimpse of the moon ; the figures 
and the rocks lit up by the flames which 
licked up from the furnace below — and all 
the while the weird chant rising and falling 
in the still night air. 

Suddenly there was a hush, and then a 
great shout — all the crosses were pushed 
down into the pit below ; a hurdle was put 
on the top covered with grass and then with 
mud. The sacrifices are entombed under 
the earth for three hours. Of course, the 
fire is extinguished for want of air, but the 
heat of the pit is sufficient to cook the Iambs 
whole. Unleavened bread and bitter herbs 
are passed round to all, including visitors. 
At midnight, according to the law, they eat 
the Passover with great haste, standing, their 
shoes on their feet, their staffs in their hands. 
They tear the lambs to pieces with their 
fingers, and eat as fast and as much as they 
can, burning up all that remains. You can 
see what a wonderful sight it is. I was sorry 
that I could not stay right to the end. 

On the next day I wanted to return to 
Jerusalem, but was unable to get a carriage. 



THE SAMARITAN PASSOVER 93 

and so waited to travel with Mrs. S ; who 

was also a guest at Dr. W — ■ — 's. In the 
morning, the dispenser, a native Christian, 
took me up Mount Ebal. Though he had 
lived under its shadow all his life, he had 
never before been up to its summit, and he 
could not quite understand my wanting to 
go on such a hot morning ; however, I had 
read George Adam Smith, Chap. VI., and was 
determined not to miss the view from the 
top of the mountain. Ebal is slightly higher 
than Gerizim, but has no historical connec- 
tion, except that it is the Mount of Cursing. 
It is in the very centre of Palestine, and you 
can see almost the whole of the country south 
to Mizpeh, within five miles of Jerusalem ; 
practically the whole coast to far up beyond 
Carmel, all the hills round Galilee, and even 
beyond, up to Hermon with its everlasting 
snow ; and on the east, as from every high 
point in Palestine, the unbroken wall of the 
Mounts of Moab and Reuben, Gad, and half 
Manasseh. It certainly is a wonderful view. 



DAILY SIGHTS AND TALES 



DAILY SIGHTS AND TALES 



Jerusalem is the place for cranks. I pass 
one every day as I go into the city gate, 
who is dressed in long white robes and 
wears long hair. He stands there barefoot 
holding a bright lamp filled with olive oil 
and well trimmed. He thinks he is one of 
the ten Virgins, and is standing there month 
after month with his lamp ready and waiting. 
Talking of going barefoot, you know the 
feet of the natives who wear no shoes be- 
come as hard as leather. One came into 
school the other day, and having obtained a 
needle and cotton he sewed two parts of his 
foot together where his sole had split. 

One man here used to stagger through 
the streets under a heavy cross, being deter- 
mined to "take up his cross and follow.'' 
Are not these sort of things very Eastern, 
and really just like the symbolical actions 
of the old prophets ? 

97 



98 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

The Turkish Government has just passed 
a law that all men of a certain age, whether 
Christian or not, must serve as conscripts 
unless they are married to a girl that is an 
orphan. An orphan girls' mission school 
here is being besieged by young men who 
are all very anxious to be shown over it. 
Orphans are at a high premium. 

One of the teachers at the C.M.S. College 
here has just been taken off to prison because 
when he was out for a donkey ride with 

R his animal stumbled, and in falling 

he knocked down a little boy. They think 
nothing of prison here apparently. Amongst 
the natives, if you want to find a friend, you 
go first and see if he is in gaol. The cells 
are ; open to the public, and prisoners are 
supplied with food by their friends. One 
popular prisoner is thus sometimes able to 
stand the whole gang a sumptuous dinner. 

A lady from Cairo society sitting next me 
at dinner told me that it used to be the 
regular thing for people who had servants 
they particularly valued to have them put in 
prison while they went away on their holiday, 
lest they should drift into other situations; 



DAILY SIGHTS AND TALES 99 

but such things are not done there now. 
At one prison the prisoners are kept in a 
confused mass in a sort of bear pit, and 
the tourists go and throw them coins to see 
them fight. As you can imagine, these are 
awful places for breeding disease. Dr. 

C (a Syrian) has given us a lecture on 

Charms " and amulets ; he has a collection 
of 700, which he has obtained from his 
patients and others. Charms he found most 
common amongst the native Christians, 
although the Moslems say that "spirits" 
are so numerous that one could not drop 
a pin from the sky without hitting at least 
one. The most to be feared is the power of 
the **evil eye," which they avoid by wear- 
ing a blue bead marked like an eye. Next 
there is the "hand of evil," which they avoid 
in the same way by wearing an imitation 
hand. Passages of the Koran written in 
a cup make water from it the best possible 
medicine. 

It is wonderful to see the porters here 
(who are a particular class of men) carrying 
things about the town on their backs. Yester- 
day I saw a man carrying sixteen boxes, 



loo ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

each about the size of a small cube sugar-box. 
No Englishman would look at the things 
they carry. One man has been known to 
take a ton for a wager. You often see 
two men going along together, one carrying 
nothing, the other toiling under enough for 
three. It makes one think of the aptness of 
the illustrations used, Luke xi. 46 ; Gal. vi. 
2 and 5. The other day I saw an interest- 
ing sight at the station. A Syrian, evi- 
dently returning from America, was met by 
friends, probably his father and brothers. 
There was quite a Jacob and Esau scene, 
during which I was trying to get past the 
ticket collector's gate. The traveller simply 
threw himself on the neck of each one in 
turn and wept and howled with emotion. 
One is naturally reminded of the Prodigal's 
return. These Easterns are very emotional. 

The poverty of some of the Jews here 
is something too awful to contemplate. I 
believe a great lot of money is spent by 
charitable Jewish organizations in other 
lands, but it seldom seems to get to the 
most needy. We are disgusted at the 
custom of throwing all refuse and foul 



DAILY SIGHTS AND TALES loi 

matter into the streets, and bless the dogs 
for doing their best in the scavenging 
line ; but with the poorest Jews it is the 
reverse. The filth of the street is their 
only means of staving off starvation, and 
the dogs are thus their rivals. They beg 
at the shops, and often have to try two or 
three places to get a para, 1 5 of which make 
a metalik, which is worth ^d. Those who 
work among them tell me that it may easily 
take a whole morning's tramping to obtain 
this metalik. 

The other day I heard of some amusing 
incidents connected with the German Em- 
perors visit here about twelve years ago. 
He went to see all the German institutions. 
The head mistress of the Talitha Cumi 
School on showing him over said very 
boldly, " We want a dining-hall ; will you 
give us one ? " That evening an architect 
was sent up, an estimate made, and the 
whole thing put down to the Emperor's 
account. A few days later the Emperor 
visited Schnellers' boys' school, a very large 
institution. The head master received him 
with great ceremony, and began complaining 



I02 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

of the bad water supply. He enlarged on 
the benefit it would be if they had a good 
swimming-bath ; they had to send down into 
Jerusalem even for drinking water, and 
they would be most grateful if he could do 
anything towards their getting water, to at 
least give the boys a good drink. That 
evening the Emperor sent up six donkeys 
with water-skins and a note saying he would 
like a receipt, and hoped it was sufficient for 
the boys to have a good drink. Later, when 
at Damascus he was entertained in a lordly 
manner by a native prince, in a room where 
the furniture was magnificent even for the 
East. The prince, seeing him admire the 
carpet, said with Eastern politeness, " All is 
yours." "Thank you," said the Emperor; 
and next morning he sent up his men with a 
van and had the furniture packed up. He 
said he would teach people to say what they 
meant. 

The war (Turkish-Italian). The other 
day the Turkish authorities at Jaffa received 
a telegram which had been stopped at the 
post office, and handed over to them ; it 
said, " Italian Prince arrives to-morrow." 



DAILY SIGHTS AND TALES 103 



The authorities, in a great state of excite- 
ment, cabled to Constantinople the news, 
and asked what they were to do. They 
were told to treat him with all respect, and 
give him what he wanted. In the mean- 
time the steamer, for it was the name of a 
vessel, was impatiently waiting out at sea 
signalling for boats to come to take her 
passengers off. 

July ^th, — Last night we heard an awful 
yelling mob rush past the hotel during 
dinner ; it was a crowd who had been 
attempting to lynch a Mugrabe Jew (North 
African). The man was surrounded by 
soldiers, and being taken to the Serai, he 
was stripped and bleeding from head to foot. 
Lately there have been several cases of kid- 
napping children by these Jews, like this 
case, where the mob attacked the man 
finding him carrying off children in a sack. 
The same cry is beginning again which has 
so often been heard in Europe, that the Jews 
eat Christian children. We hope the kid- 
napping will soon be stopped or there may 
be a Jewish persecution. Recently a Greek 



I04 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

priest, who wears his hair long like a 
woman, saw a child fall down in the street ; 
he picked it up. The crowd thought he was 
a Jew dressed up, and set on him, and pulled 
his hair out. 



ASCENSION DAY, 1912 



ASCENSION DAY, 1912 

Thursday last, being Ascension Day, six of 
us here arranged to go up to the Mount of 
Olives before dawn, and see the sun rise 
over the Mountains of Moab, and to be 
present at the ceremonies connected with the 
day. We asked the waiter to call us, but 
somehow his alarum did not go off ; and if 
it had not been for a friendly mosquito, the 
whole expedition would have been wrecked. 
We were told the sun would rise at 5.15, so 
it was extremely fortunate that a mosquito 
found its way into my net, and settled on 
my nose exactly at 4.30. I tumbled into 
my clothes, and banged at the only door 
whose number I knew. 

Whilst waiting, I found two of the party 
disconsolately returning to their rooms, as 
they did not know the way, nor my room, 
being new arrivals. At last we got started, 
and hurried past the Green Hill, down into 
107 H 2 



io8 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

the Kedron Valley, and up the steep moun- 
tain path to the village on the top of the 
Mount of Olives. 

The sun rose as we went up, and as we 
turned to look back we could see the soft 
light of dawn upon Jerusalem. The view 
from this point is superb, the whole city- 
being spread out like a map below. That 
morning the sight was beyond description. 
The dull, grey city of old Jerusalem was 
suddenly bathed in a flood of golden light 
from the Ascended StiUy and it became the 
Holy City of Gold — a new Jerusalem. To 
me it seems a beautiful custom to have 
these Ascension services at this time in the 
morning. As the sun ascends into the 
heavens, the grey Jerusalem is changed into 
the Jerusalem of gold : so Christ ascended 
leaving the same grey Jerusalem of earth 
for the Holy City which He is preparing 
above. The traditional spot of the Ascen- 
sion is guarded by the Moslems, who, of 
course, consider Christ a prophet, and the 
stone, with the traditional footmark, is under 
the dome of the mosque, which is surrounded 
by a courtyard. The various Churches 



ASCENSION DAY, 1912 109 

somehow obtain permission to hold their 
services in the courtyard, and even in the 
mosque itself. 

It was into this courtyard that we first 
pushed our way, crushed in a crowd of 
pilgrims of every nationality, surging to and 
fro. On the eastern side of the mosque 
were awnings suspended, forming very dirty 
and tattered tents. At the back of each was 
an altar covered with ornaments and candles. 
Each Church had its own tent, the Latins, 
Greeks, Armenians, Abyssinians, Copts, and 
Syrians ; but the crowd surged backwards 
and forwards, peering into each tent in turn. 
Each Church seemed to have its own time to 
go into the mosque, which is just a dome 
about as big as a fair-sized dining-room. 

We went in with the Greeks, who, as soon 
as the Latins had cleared off, took the place 
by a great rush. The pilgrims were all 
falling over each other in their effort to 
reach the rock in the floor, which has a foot- 
mark impressed in it. All the while the 
priests sat calmly behind it, selling, at a 
great pace, pieces of paper cut the shape of 
the sole of a foot, which they touched on 



no ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

the stone, and then passed over the crowd 
to the highest bidder. 

We walked back to Jerusalem somewhat 
sickened by the sight ; such scenes are not 
likely to give "great joy " (Luke xxiv. 52). 



TPIE CONVENT OF THE 
CROSS 



THE CONVENT OF THE CROSS 



On Whit Monday I walked over to see the 
Convent of the Cross. It is about two miles 
due west, over a very rough uncivilized road. 
All these roads, except the four or five 
which have been recently made by Euro- 
peans, are just simply tracks worn into the 
rocky hillside by the use of centuries, like 
the paths of the Lake District. 

The convent is situated in a little valley 
by itself, and is surrounded] by its own 
lands. All these country convents, like the 
monasteries of the Middle Ages, are houses 
of industry, hospitality, and piety. They 
reap a good income from their olives, and 
always have their cellars full of the best 
home-made wine. There are a great many 
about, and the monks are most hospitable, 
being always pleased to take in any travellers, 
ladies or gentlemen, especially if they have 
a letter from an episcopal dignitary. Tourists 

113 



114 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

are expected to give something to their 
common fund ; pilgrims are entertained quite 
free. 

This particular convent has of late obtained 
a reputation for learning, and is now a 
college where there are a good number of 
students, who are clothed, boarded, and 
given a theological training. They have 
a good library, including many English 
books (Sir Walter Scott's, etc.). They also 
dole out bread to the poor, and wine on fast 
days. In fact, they seem to correspond to 
one's idea of old English monasteries. This 
particular one is extremely ancient, dating 
from long before the Crusades, and it has 
twice been taken by an enemy, and all 
within it killed. 

They show you the blood marks (?) on the 
chapel floor. It is called the Convent of the 
Cross because it is said to stand on the spot 
where the tree grew which was afterwards 
used for the cross. The exact spot — three 
inches in diameter — was reverently pointed 
out by the monk, who could only speak 
Greek and Arabic. 

The story, which is abundantly illustrated 



THE CONVENT OF THE CROSS 115 

by pictures on the chapel walls, is as 
follows : — 

Lot when he fled from Sodom, took with 
him a stick or root, and planted it here. 
Abraham, knowing that it ^should be con- 
nected with the Redemption, carefully watered 
it. The devil, wishing to frustrate God's 
purpose, endeavoured, when Abraham was 
not looking, to hew it down, but he turned 
just in time, and drove the devil away. It 
was in a monastery dedicated to such non- 
sense that the Patriarch and all the highest 
officials here were educated ! 

However, the building is very interesting, 
being a perfect fort, with its external wall 
very massive and high, with windows only at 
the top, and a little heavy iron door about 
four feet high and three feet wide. 

The Bishops are usually chosen from 
monks who are not ordained or married. 
Those who are ordained are married. The 
orders of Priests and Deacons are separate 
(like our army and navy) and often a man 
does not pass from one to the other. 



THE SI LOAM TUNNEL 



THE SILOAM TUNNEL 



The other night after dinner some of us 
went to explore the famous Siloam tunnel. 
On the side of the hill outside the present 
south wall of Jerusalem, known as Ophel, 
the hill on which stood the city of David, 



and before it the fortress of Jebus, there is 
the only real exhaustless spring of fresh 
water near Jerusalem. This spring was no 
doubt the reason why Jebus was built on the 
hill. Solomon filled up the valley by an 
artificial causeway to the neighbouring height 
of the old temple site, and extended the city 
of David over the neighbouring hills (i Kings 
xi. 27 ; Millo = filling up). 




119 



I20 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

The spring is now called the Virgin's 
Fount, and originally burst out at the foot of 
the hill, and ran down the valley. The 
Jebusites cut a horizontal tunnel into the 
hill and then a perpendicular shaft down to 
it from the centre of their rock fortress, so 
that they could draw up water without going 
outside the city wall (see Fig.), simply by 
descending some steps in the middle of their 
town to the head of the shaft. The taking 
of Jebus described in 2 Sam. v. 6-8, seems 
to have been achieved (2 Sam. v. 8) by 
Joab getting into this tunnel with some of 
his men, climbing the shaft, and bursting 
out into the city from within while the men 
of the place were standing on the walls, 
laughing at David at the foot of the hill. 
Later King Hezekiah (2 Kings xx. 20), 
hearing that Sennacherib was coming, in 
order that he might have plenty of water 
for himself and also to leave none for the 
invaders outside the city, stopped up the 
fountain and continued the tunnel some 600 
yards through the solid rock into the next 
valley which Solomon had included into his 
city, making a large pool by damming up the 



THE SILOAM TUNNEL 121 



valley so as to hold all the water. This pool 
is the Pool of Siloam. There are several 
basin-like cuttings in the rock which are 
supposed to have been used by the fullers, 
being near the spring (cf. 2 Kings xviii. 17). 
I believe also the great prophecy, Isa. vii. 
14, took place here (cf. Isa. vii. 3). I 
wanted to see the place where used to be 
the famous inscription found in the wall of 
the tunnel by an old boy of the L.J. Society 
School (possibly the oldest Hebrew writing 
extant), which describes how the workmen 
beginning at each end had some difficulty 
in meeting in the middle, but finally "pick 
answered pick " and they rejoiced to see the 
water flow through, which it has done ever 
since. 

There was a gentleman staying here who 
wished to come. I made inquiries from two 
experts as to whether it was possible. They 
had both been in at each end, but I do not 
think either had been right through. They 
said that there was an iron grating fixed in 
the middle by the explorers Parker, etc., and 
that the spring being intermittent the water 
would suddenly rise to within a few inches 

I 



122 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

of the roof in places, and that we must 
inquire of the natives of Siloam, and that 
they would probably be able to tell us at 
what time it would rise next. So I got two 
boys from the school to talk to the natives 
in Arabic, and at 8.30 in the evening Messrs. 

B and R , with two ladies from the 

hotel who wished to see the fun, and the two 
boys, started off down to the Pool of Siloam, it 
being almost full moon. After a parley with 
some of the men we found out they did not 
know when the water would flow next, and 
they were sure there was a fence so that we 
could not get right through. However, we 
left one boy outside with the two ladies, 
jumped into the water at the entrance where 
it flows out into the pool, and started off into 
the darkness. The tunnel is very neatly cut 
some 2 feet wide and 600 yards long. For 
some way we were only in water up to our 
knees, but the roof which had started at 
about 7 feet was now some 18 feet up. We 
passed the hole in the rock where the in- 
scription had been cut out, and after this the 
roof got lower and lower, until we had to 
stoop to walk along ; here the water was not 



THE SILOAM TUNNEL 123 

much above our boots. We soon came to 
a shaft cut roughly up into the hill above ; 
this I climbed, to find it blocked at the top 
by huge stones which looked like the ruins 
of some building that had stood above. We 
went on some distance further, and came 
across the place where the workmen from 
each end must have met ; there were two or 
three blind alleys and turns as if they could 
hear each other but could not meet. Some 
way on the water became deeper and reached 
to the top of my w^alking-stick. Here we 
came to the old Jebusite tunnel up which 
Joab had crept, and which ends in the shaft 
which goes perpendicularly up to the top of 
the hill. Down this there was a strong wind 
blowing, which blew out some of our candles. 
A few yards further we reached the cavern of 
the spring, and came out up the steps on to 
the hillside. We had gone right through 
having seen no barrier. We walked back in 
our wet things to the lower pool, where the 
ladies were waiting and expecting us to 
emerge. Then all walked back by the 
Kedron Valley, having gone right round the 
city. The curious bend is supposed to have 



124 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

been made to avoid the sacrilege of passing 
under the tombs of the Kings, David, etc. 
If this is so, then, perhaps, some day the price- 
less treasures which are known to have been 
hidden there will be unearthed. The hill 
itself is now ploughed in terraces according 
to the prophecy, ''Jerusalem shall be ploughed 
as a field." 



V 



"NEBY SAMWIL" 



-NEBY SAMWIL^' 

On Thursday afternoon I arranged to take 
Miss — — over to Neby Samwil, as neither 
of us had been there. It is of interest for 
several reasons. The highest hill-top of the 
range in this part, it is only six miles from 
here, and from it you can see the Plain of 
Sharon, the land of the Philistines unto ''the 
Great Sea, and the going down of the Sun." 
You can also see up to Ebal and Gerizim 
(30 miles away). The barren hills of Hebron 
to the south, where Abraham lived when Lot 
chose Sodom, and on the east, the inevitable 
Mountains of Moab. Such a conspicuous 
hill, so central and with such an extensive 
view, is very naturally named in the Old 
Testament Mizpah (a watch-tower). From 
its position, it has of necessity occupied an 
important place in history. The Crusaders 
called it Mons Gaudii. It ;was their first 
camp in sight of the sacred city which they 
had come to recapture. Its chief interest, 
however, is in its connection with Samuel, 
from which it gets its modern name. Samuel 

127 



128 ROUND ABOUT JERSALEM 

lived at Ramah, but went on circuit to 
Bethel, Gilgal, and Mizpeh (i Sam. vii. i6). 
As you stand in the village, on the roof of 
one of the houses which cluster round the 
summit, and look over the rolling hills to 
the south-west, stretching below you to the 
Philistine country, and the sea, you fancy 
you can see the whole scene of i Sam. vii. 
6-12. As we climbed uphill to the village 
above — I was toiling behind, driving the 
donkeys up the steep and rocky mountain- 
path — we passed women coming down, and 
were 'greeted by the peasants, who, with 
sickle in hand, were reaping the corn. We 
could appreciate almost every detail of the 
story of those two who had climbed that 
same hill before (i Sam. ix.). ''Up" is 
very noticeable inverses 11-14; certainly I 
realized its force clambering after those 
donkeys. We had a lot of difficulty in 
getting started as the lady's donkey was 
rather thin, the result being that, in order to 
balance, she held on by the reins, which so 
annoyed the animal that it would only go 
round in circles. We had given up the 
attempt once and were returning home when 
she decided she would try my suggestion of 



"NEBY SAMWIL" 129 

riding my donkey straddle-legged. I had 
hardly liked to suggest it, as I had a native 
saddle which is very wide, and the lady is 
by no means a chicken. However, after one 
or two efforts, in which the donkey just 
moved off when I had got her well up into 
the air, we finally succeeded by my leaning 
up against the donkey and Miss climb- 
ing up. When once she was planted on and 
properly set, we both thought it best not to 
unload till we arrived. All this made us 
late, so that when we reached Neby Samwil 
the sun was shining down over the Mediter- 
ranean. Here we changed saddles and found 
it more comfortable, only I had the thin 
donkey with the big saddle. We were just 
going down to the end of the city (i Sam. 
ix. 27), and had arrived near the place where 
I supposed Israel's first king was anointed ; 

Miss had passed on in front, and I 

stayed behind to think, when suddenly my 
saddle slipped under the donkey, and I found 
myself lying on my back on the ground with . 
the ass looking down at me, with a pained 
sort of surprised expression. I have found 
out since that those donkeys have a trick of 
puffing themselves out when the girths are 



I30 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

being done up so that it may be nice and 
loose. 

On our return through the valley which 
leads to Neby Samwil I noticed several 
fine tombs cut out of the solid rock. They 
are known as the Tombs of the Judges. 
The hillside is cut away to leave a face 
of rock, and this is carved in bas-relief, 




making very imposing entrances, in the 
centre of which a low square door is cut 
which leads to a fairly spacious room out of 
w^hich the tombs or places for the bodies 
open directly. I believe they are said to be 
Roman. 

As M. W had not seen the finest one, 

we returned another day. Some of these tombs 
— in fact, most of them — are used as sheep- 
folds, and being out on the hillside, serve that 



'*NEBY Sx^MWIL" 131 

purpose very well, but this does not improve 
them for the sightseer, as these black sheep 
and mountain goats are by no means clean 
animals. We had walked a long way, and 
it was getting late, and though I had not 
noticed it before, I now found I was aching 

in every limb. M. W , too, was evidently 

anxious to get home, and we went faster and 
faster till we reached the hotel door. Mrs. 

was there to meet us, but M. W 

pushed by and disappeared into her own 
room, while I was left a moment to say 

what we had seen. I noticed that Mrs. ■ 

looked hard at me and was just wondering 
Avhether my tie was not straight or what, 
when she leant forward, saying, Excuse 
me, but you have a little fly on your coat — 
no, it isn*t, though — Oh ! there's another ! 
Where have you been ? " I was just turning 
round to explain, when she exclaimed, " Fly, 
they have swarmed on you." In spite of 
my aching limbs, I did fly to my room, and 
in two minutes had flung every stitch of 
clothing out of the window, in my excite- 
ment quite forgetting my watch and purse, 
and was leaping up and down my room like 
the Priests of Baal on Carmel, or a caged 



132 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

lion at feeding time, only instead of cutting 
myself with knives, I was throwing jugfuls 
of water over myself — I looked like a gory 
chunk of meat. My word ! it was awful. 
Looking back on the scene of that battle- 
field with the corpses strewn around and the 
smell of Keating's powder in the air, I am 
appalled to think of the amount of blood 
that was shed, but, after all, I suppose it was 
mostly my own. The porter secured the 

purse and watch. M. W turned up late 

for dinner, and when she did there was a 
twinkle in her eye and an uneasiness of 

manner which only Mrs. H and I could 

interpret. 

June 1 7//^. — For some time past I have had 
my eye on a high hill to the south-west of 
Jerusalem, and last Thursday settled to see 

the view from there. M. W said she would 

come, so at about 3 p.m. we set off on two 
sturdy donkeys across the Valley of Hinnom 
and on to the Plain of Rephaim, where now 
stands the station, and where David fought 
his most famous battles with the Philistines. 

This time we took the precaution to have 
a donkey boy ; unfortunately, our " boy " 



"NEBY SAMWIL" 133 



was an old man too old to run, and so our 
progress was slow. The first six miles is 
along the Bethlehem road. When within 
half a mile, and just past RacheFs Tomb 
(traditional), which we were lucky enough to 
find open, and crowded with Jews wailing, 
we turned off along the Hebron road, and 
then to the right, into a most glorious grove 
of olive trees. It is said to be one of the 
finest groves in Palestine, and certainly justi- 
fies "Bethlehem" being called "House of 
Food " (Ps. cxxxii. 6). The path, which 
was a very good one, wound along under the 
shadow of olive trees, over the soft, rich, 
brown soil, to the foot of the hill we had set 
out to climb. We passed up through a town 
called Belt Jala, the Giloh of the Old Testa- 
ment, the home of Ahithophel, a shepherd 
companion of David in his youthful days at 
Bethlehem, who afterwards joined Absalom 
in his revolt, and seems to be mentioned 
bitterly in Pss. xli. 9 and Iv. 12-14. 

The hill became more and more steep, 
and soon after passing Beit Jala, we had to 
leave the donkeys with the old "boy," and 
climb from terrace to terrace, pulling our- 
selves and each other up by means of the 



134 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

vines, which were down in great pro- 
fusion over the rocky walls which hold up 
the soil on the hillside. It was good fun, 
though very hot, and we were very pleased 
to reach the top, from which we could see 
the Mediterranean on one side and the 
Dead Sea on the other, the former about 40, 
and the latter 20 miles away. The whole 
country was like a map, Jerusalem below us 
to the north-east and Bethlehem to the east. 

The following Saturday, I determined to 
go down into Samson's country by train, 
returning in the evening. I persuaded 

R to come too. There is no difficulty 

about time table, as there is only one line 
to Jaffa, and only two trains each way daily. 
We left by the 7.40 a.m., having bought 
tickets for Dier Aban, the second station 
down, and just where the narrow gorge — - 
through which the line runs — suddenly 
opens out as if by a door, upon the wide 
rolling hills which border on the Jaffa plain. 
However, we did not intend going quite so 
far as this, and before the train started, I 
had a little talk with the engine-driver. He 
was a Frenchman, and in their usual polite 
manner, promised to stop 30 kilometres 



^^NEBY SAMWIL" 135 

down for us to get off. This, I had calcu- 
lated by a map, would be about five miles, 
as the valley winds above Dier Aban in the 
gorge, and somewhere near the great cave 
which Samson seems to have made his 
stronghold, in the incident mentioned in 
Judg. XV. 8-13. The calculation was 
correct, but unfortunately the driver did not 
stop, and we were rushed right past the 
cave, which we could see above us on the 
other side of the chasm, and were only able 
to jump off as the train slowed down for 
Dier Aban.i 

We started off up the broad valley till we 
reached a colony of some seventy or eighty 
Rumanian Jews, who could talk French, and 
were very kind in giving us water, etc. 
From here we struck up to the left through 
the cornfields, to the top of the hill where 
stands Zorah (Judg. xiii. 2). It was with- 
out doubt in these fields that the incident 
recorded in Judges xiii. happened, and to 
add greater interest, we passed, as we 
went up, an old rock altar in a field of corn 
with steps up to it belonging to that date 
(cf.verse 19). When we reached the village, 
we were welcomed by some men of the 



136 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

place, though we could only return the 
salutes, and were at once ushered into 
the village guest-room (just three sides oi 
a square with a dome over the top, all of 
stone). Here the old men were all sitting 
round with the sheik in the centre. Havinpf 
taken off our boots, we squatted down with 
our hosts, glad of the shade. For more 
than an hour we kept up a kind of deaf-and- 
dumb conversation. They showed us their 
things, and we ours. One of them had 
quite a nice watch. In the meantime, coffee 
was being made over a fire at the entrance. 
We each had two cups, and then they were 
passed round to the others. After repeated 
bows on our part, and motions of a don't 
you go yet " style on theirs, we went back 
down the hill, to the Jewish colony, where 
we ate our lunch, and slept for an hour, the 
heat down in the plains there being very great. 

We then walked over the hills to the 
south, to Bethshemesh, where the Palestine 
Exploration Fund is excavating, but not 
having much time, and the excavators being 
asleep, we did not have them wakened. 
We returned by the afternoon train for 
Jerusalem. 



THE WHIRLWIND . 



4 



THE WHIRLWIND 

July. — To-day I was sitting under the 
shade of a wall, waiting for some cricket. 
It was perfectly still and very hot — not a 
breath of wind — when suddenly I heard a 
rushinp- noise on the other side of the wall, 
and the next moment a crowd of old tin 
cans came hustling over about ten yards 
away. Immediately they all jumped into 
the air again, and a lot more lying on a 
scrap heap close by. Then I realized what 
was happening. It was a whirlwind, con- 
fined to a few square feet. It rushed along 
about as fast as a horse could gallop, and 
everything it touched jumped high into the 
air. It passed by a big olive tree, which 
was almost uprooted, and a Bedouin tent, 
pitched under its shade and well pegged 
down, was lifted some 30 feet into the air. 
If it were not for the high column of sand 

139 K 2 



140 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

and dust passing over the Mount of Olives, 
I could almost think I had dreamed it. 

Mr. H — — says that I was fortunate to 
see it so well, as they are very rare here, 
and are very seldom as strong as this. I 
wish I could have got a photo of all the tins 
leaping up off the scrap-heap, as if the laws 
of gravity had been suddenly reversed. 

It is no wonder that primitive people 
saw deities in nature. I suppose they were 
partly right, though ''Jehovah is not in the 
Whirlwind.'' 

The DiDACHEE " 

I have made two attempts to see the 
library of the Greek Patriarch, as I par- 
ticularly wanted to see a manuscript I 
had read a lot about in Cambridge, called 
the AtSa^^, or " Teaching of the Twelve 
Apostles." The first time we went, a 
priest who, like myself, could only speak 
broken French, told me I must come at 
2.30 in the afternoon. The next time 
another told me I must come in the 
morning, but now we have managed to do 
it by means of a deacon whom I have got 



THE WHIRLWIND 141 

to know. We went at 8 a.m., and he was 
very kind, and showed us many interesting 
MSS., including the one I wanted to see. It 
is a ninth-century copy of a second-century 
MS., and is unique in being the only copy 
in existence, the work being only found else- 
where in early Christian quotations. It is 
a second-century or possibly first-century 
account of what the Apostles taught con- 
cerning the customs and ceremonies of the 
Christian services. 



PETRA" 



"PETRA" 

'jidy c^th. — My word! I am in luck's way. 
I have just had an invitation to go with a 

Dr. B to Petra." " Petra ! " Any one 

who has seen it is considered quite an 
explorer. As the crow flies it is no miles 
into the Great Arabian desert, but as we 
shall have to go, it will be much more than 
this each way. " Petra," the oldj rock city 
of centuries ago, all the houses, churches, 
temples, theatres, tombs, etc., are cut out 
of the solid rock at the foot of Mount Hor, 

where Aaron was buried. Dr. B , a 

C.M.S. missionary amongst the Bedouin 
and Arabs at £s Salt on the mountains of 
Moab, wrote that he was getting a small 

party to go there, would R and I join ? 

We should be camping with the Bedouin, 
and get a lot of hard riding over mountain 
and desert. We shall probably be away a 
fortnight, and if we ride hard, we may get 
four days there. 



146 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

Es Salt, July 21st. — So here I am, having 
passed the first stage of my journey. We — 

i.e. R and I — had heard that people 

sometimes ride here from Jerusalem in one 
day, and being extremely busy, we determined 
to attempt this ; however, nearly everybody 
said we were foolish, and that we ought to 
stay one night at Jericho. We got three 
horses and a little Arab boy to take them 
back, and started just after midnight on 
Friday. From that time we were in the 
saddle almost continually until we reached 
this door at 3.15 on Saturday afternoon. It 
certainly was an experience which we shall 
never forget. The night was a very dark 
one, there being no moon, though the stars 
were brilliant and we were a frisky company 
as we left the hotel. The horses were real 
Arab steeds with no end of vigour, and went 
splendidly for the first ten hours, though 
they had to be urged on towards the end. 
The Jericho road has a bad name from of 
old, and of late there have been several 

robberies, so R borrowed a revolver, 

which he kept in his belt. It was weird in 
the extreme, riding down the winding wadies 



"PETRA" 147 

which lead to the Jordan plain, and con- 
tinually meeting bands of Bedouin prowling 
about in the night with camels and donkeys. 
. Whenever we heard any men in front, the 
boy always rode on and exchanged greetings. 
We asked if he was armed. No," he 
said, God is my defence," of course in 
Arabic. We passed by the inn of The 
Good Samaritan," just getting off to look in 
at the sleepers, lying huddled up all round, 
and then as the sky showed slight signs of 
the approach of dawn we rode into the 
valley popularly known as the " Valley of 
Blood." However, we found that there was 
a human defence also, in the shape of a 
picket of Turkish soldiers, who were posted 
here because of recent disturbances. We 
heard that they had just beheaded three 
men for highway robbery. As we rode on 
and down the cliffs which descend to the 
Jericho plains, the sky became brilliant in 
the extreme, and the view became — well, 
indescribable. 

Passing through Jericho the sun rose, and 
here R — — wanted to wait for breakfast, 
but I knew that at all costs we must push 



148 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

across the plain before it got hot. For an 
hour and a half we were riding across the 
wonderful flat country (as flat as Peter- 
borough), passing companies of Bedouin, 
sheep, horses, donkeys, camels, all as so 
often pictured in Genesis. Several times 
our horses broke out into furious gallops, 
feeling the freedom of the desert, so we 
scampered on into the weird hillocks of sand, 
which the Jordan, in prehistoric ages, has 
worn into the plain, and after another half- 
hour we reached the Jordan itself with its 
tropical jungle banks. We paid the toll and 
rode across the curious wooden tubular 
bridge, and then sat down in the shade of 
the jungle by the riverside for our breakfast 
of sardines, eggs, and bread ; we drank what 
water we had with us, and filled the bottle 

with the muddy Jordan water. R was 

then for a slack, but I knew we had two and 
a half hours' more riding on the plain, and 
was firm for going on at once. The boy 
said we must go back to Jericho, and go on 
to Salt the next day, but this we refused 
to do. 

When we got out of the jungle and on to 



''PETRA" 



149 



our horses again, we found that the heat 
was already intense, although it was still 
only about 8 a.m. The plain, which had 
been covered with dew, was steaming, and 
we felt just as if we were being steamed 
over a kettle. We put handkerchiefs to 
hang down from our hats, and silently rode 
for the hills, which were some two hours dis- 
tant. We were told when too late, the night 

before, that though Mr. H had been 

across many times, he would never dream 
of crossing the plain after breakfast in the 
summer, and that he did not think the Arab 
would allow his horses to go. However, 
after about one hour we were very much 
relieved to find a steady, if slight, cool 
breeze blowing, and the last part in com- 
parison was really not so bad. 

As we drew near the foot of the hills we 
met more Arabs, who were on their way 
down. They asked our boy if he had any 
water. He answered that they could get 
some at the Jordan, knowing we should 
want all of ours. One hardly understands 
the force of all the metaphors about water'* 
in the Bible until one has been out here. 



ISO ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

Where there is a spring there is a town and 
history ; roads must go where water can be 
found, and journeys arranged accordingly. 
Our boy was right, we did need every drop 
of that muddy Jordan water. For three 
hours we cHmbed up the dried-up water- 
course, the sun still scorching down, and 
now the wind was cut off by the hills, when 
suddenly we came upon a fig-tree clinging 
to the rocks. This tree is a famous land- 
mark on the route, and we had been told of 
it before starting from Jerusalem. After 
leaving the Jordan, it is the only tree one 
sees all the way up the mountains. We 
hastened into its little shade to find that the 
figs were not ripe. Under this tree was the 
only water between Jordan and Es Salt 
(seven hours) ; it was just a puddle in a hole 
about as big as a footbath, to which you 
descend by steps, and yet this was sufficient 
to make the place a camping-ground. The 
puddle was full of swarming creatures, so 
we decided to drink our bottle of Jordan 
water and fill it again, though we hoped that 
the liquid would not be needed. From here 
we pushed on for another hour and a half, 



**PETRA" 151 

and on reaching the top of the wady, we 
had a grand view of the Jordan Valley and 
mountains of Jiidsea and Samaria. On the 
top we also came across a large Bedouin 
encampment, and being very thirst}^, and 
also wishing to humour them, we rode straight 
into the middle of their camp, and waving 
our hats in the air with a flourish, we jumped 
to the ■ ground, and saluting asked for 

moysh " (water). They seemed very 
pleased to see us, and at once spread cushions 
under one of the long black goats'-hair tents, 
where we reclined Vv^hile they fetched a bowl 
full of filthy-looking water, out of which 
everybody drank in turn, and which tasted 
very much of skins. They at once lit a fire 
just in front of us, and proceeded to make 
coffee. We each had to drink twice from a 
tiny little cup, which was then handed all 
round. The young women and children 
all hung about in crowds, staring, but the 
old women sat with us and the men, smoking 
long black wooden pipes. The men smoked 
our cigarettes. 

From here we pushed on again. After 
another hour's climb we reached our first 



152 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

view of cultivation — terraces of vines. For 
three metaliks [i.e. for i\d.) we had not only 
more than we could eat, but also far more 
than we could carry with comfort, four large 
bunches of grapes each. 

The hills of Gilead are extremely fertile, 
giving one some idea of what Palestine was 
like when it was described as flowing with 
milk and honey. Some of the bunches were 
more than a foot long. We rode on munch- 
ing handfuls for another hour and a half up 
hill, and then saw Es Salt in a valley just 
below us. By this time both our horses and 
ourselves were somewhat tired, and we slowly 
wended our way down, and were very glad 
to tumble off at the doctor's door, where we 
had a very hearty welcome, and were soon 
made to feel quite at home. This is a town 
of 1 7,000 inhabitants, and is the only medical 
mission station on this side Jordan. When 
the C.M.S. came here some twenty years 
ago, the people were a very ignorant lot, 
who had no mosque, and only through 
custom observed the Mohammedan habits 
and superstitions. They say that one who 
was a Greek somehow got hold of a Bible, 



^'PETRA" 153 

and becoming interested, read it to his 
friends. They soon became dissatisfied with 
their former ideas and asked at Nablus for a 
teacher ; then a native pastor was sent, who 
built up the nucleus for the present congre- 
gation, which is 400 strong, and is the 
largest native congregation in the whole 
country. Yesterday morning (Sunday) it 
was quite inspiring to sit in the crowded 
congregation of the little stone church, and 
join in the hearty services conducted by the 
old native pastor, assisted by the retired 
pastor, who is older still. The service was 
perfectly easy to follow as it was simply 
ours in Arabic. The hymns were to the 
best known English tunes, and they sang so 
heartily that I was able to sing what I could 
remember of our version without any fear of 
putting any one out. They have no particular 
idea of time, but sing all the tunes in a 
rhythmic kind of chant, swaying on quite 
regardless of the harmonium. The last 
hymn went to the tune of God save the 
King," and it sounded very quaint being 
shouted by Arab voices. The Christian 
women do not drop the custom of the veil, 

L 



154 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

and all sit in a group at the back of the 
church. The Moslems have just lately built 
a mosque here. The Arabs, who are dark, 
like fair hair, and in spite of our boy's 
denials, the rumour has got through the 

town that R and I are really husband 

and wife. Salt is famous for grapes, and is 
the origin of the word " sultana." 

On Tuesday afternoon (July 23rd) we 
went up to the top of what is probably 
Mount Pisgah ; it is only about one and a 
half hours above Es Salt. We found it a 
pleasant walk up the vine-covered slopes to 
the top. My word ! what a view we did 
get { You see nothing until you reach the 
top, and then you come to what is practically 
a precipice, with the whole of Palestine 
below and around. To get some idea of the 
extent of our view, read the description in 
Deut. xxxiv. 1-3. Giiead, of course, was 
the east of the Jordan up to Dan — that is, to 
Mount Hermon with its snow-capped top 
100 miles away ; Napthali and the hills 
round Galilee 50 miles away ; Ephraim 
and Manasseh with the Nablus, Ebal, and 
Gerizim, etc. ; Judah, with the Mount of 



-PETRA^' 155 

Olives, and, most remarkable of all (verse 3), 
the wonderful Jordan Valley and Dead Sea, 
spread out just like a map 5000 feet below. 
It almost took my breath away because of 
the abruptness of the view. It will remain 
in my mind as one of the most dramatic 
scenes of the Old Testament ; Old Moses 
having given his life up to the one object, 
and then as he toils up the last few yards, 
suddenly this wonderful view of the promised 
land bursts on his eyes. He gazes round 
bewildered, and then overcome with emotion, 
falls back and dies. The hill is called now 
Jebel Osea, and the Moslems show, as one 
of their shrines, the tomb of Hosea. They 
claim that the body of Moses was carried by 
angels to the west of Jordan. 

The next day, after a picnic lunch on the 
floor, the second part of our journey began. 
We had seven horses and mules, all loaded 
up so that you could hardly see which way 
round they were. We each mounted one 
and started off on the road to Ammon, five 
of us and the muleteers. It is wonderful 
what these animals can carry, and the dis- 
tances they can go. My mule had only 



156 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

come from Nablus that morning (twelve 
hours), and it was now going on to Ammon 
(four hours), to return to Es Salt that evening. 
We did not pass much of interest, except 
that we saw Jerash in the dim distance, until 
about halfway we came to two new colonies, 
one of Turcomans and the other of Circas- 
sians. At Ammon itself is another big 
Circassian colony ; here were wild-looking 
semi-European, but bigoted Moslem people 
from the Caucasus, who have been induced 
by the Turks to settle on the edge of the 
desert as a protection against the sudden - 
visits of the desert Arabs. They had be- 
longed to Russia, but, being Moslems, pre- 
ferred to live in Turkey. Though I believe 
none of the colonies are much more than 
thirty years old, yet they are grand places 
just like garden cities. Every one has his 
own little white bungalow with beautifully 
cultivated garden. This is all done in what 
would otherwise be a dry valley by means of 
a system of aqueducts. It just shows what 
the country must have been like when all the 
aqueducts were in use. These Circassians 
have very much the same problems to face 



^'PETRA" 157 

that the Israelites had when they settled here. 

Here the doctor, R , and I rode to 

the C.M.S. dispensary to get two more beds, 
and when we got to the station it was dark, 
and we found the ladies sitting on the 
baggage. The Hadj railway {i,e. pilgrims* 
railway) runs from Damascus to Medina, 
and would be continued to Mecca if it were 
not for the fanatical Moslems. At Ammon 
station we were very kindly treated by a 
Turkish officer, who gave us a large van to 
camp in for the night. Next morning we 
were having breakfast when the train steamed 
in. We finished our meal, packed up, put 
away the ladies' tent, had a last look round, 
and when we were ready, the train pro- 
ceeded. We were in a second - class 
(cheapest) corridor, similar to a London 
suburban train, and had to request some 
official to sweep out the compartment of the 
remains of nuts, figs, etc. All the rest of the 
compartments were full of pilgrims on their 
way to Mecca. They were really very inte- 
resting, but unfortunately these were not the 
only occupants of the carriage. Whilst they 
called forth our sympathy, their companions 



158 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

made our blood boil. The pilgrims spent 
all their time eating, washing their feet out 
of the window, and saying their prayers. 
In order to do the latter they placed boards 
across the seats, and, in endeavouring to face 
Mecca, were much put out by the continual 
twisting of the line. One man slept with his 
head on the seat and his feet up on the hat 
rack. 

They were mostly Egyptians, Indians, and 
Africans ; everywhere the line was guarded 
by soldiers. 

By this time the sun was overhead and 
simply blazing down; the scene was per- 
fectly dazzling. The sand stretched out all 
round as far as the horizon, sometimes in 
stretches of plains, sometimes in low dunes^ 
sometimes in great cliffs, but always sand. 
The heat seemed to come up from the 
ground as down from above, and standing 
out on the foot-board you could feel it on 
your face as if it had been a fire. I do not 
wonder that the Israelites, when they got 
through into this land of Moab and Gilead, 
did not feel inclined to push on across the 
Jordan. 



"PETRA" 159 

We were near the place where the Serpent 
was put up in the wilderness. The stations 
were still being built all down the line, 
which seemed very curious, as there was 
never the least sign of vegetation or habita- 
tion. I think they are partly to guard it 
from Bedouin, and partly to serve villages 
miles away by some oasis (like Maan). At 
one station we had a long halt, during which 
we had to get everything out of our train 
into another, as the engine of the northward 
one had jumped the points and got right 
across the line. I tried to get a photo of 
the great scramble which took place, but 
was stopped by a Turkish officer, who said 
he was anxious lest the accident should be 
heard of at headquarters. However, when 
all the fun was over he relented. 

After two hours' wait we proceeded to 
Maan- station, which is an important one 
with a lot of European type of buildings, 
including barracks, officers' house, and two 
or three shops ; also two American wind- 
mills for drawing up water from deep wells. 
Another Turkish officer who was in com- 
mand here (Maan), seeing us looking for 



i6o ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

a camping-ground, at once sent soldiers to 
take our baggage, tents, etc., and invited us 
into his garden. Here (as everywhere) he 
gave us coffee, and then said he was having 
all our things taken into his house. He 
said he would leave a soldier to do for us, 
and was going to sleep out in a tent himself. 
So he left us in comfortable possession of 
his house for the night. 

It is most remarkable how extremely polite 
and thoughtfully kind these Turkish officers 
are. They speak French, and are appar- 
ently delighted to find people to talk to. 
They cannot speak Arabic, and their soldiers 
only know the words of command in Turkish. 
.Next morning we spent a long time arguing 
with local muleteers, and then went three- 
quarters of an hour through the desert by a 
well-made road to Maan, which is really two 
cities built by a fine spring, the water of 
which soon dries up in the desert. Both 
are entirely built of bricks of sun-dried mud. 

At Maan we had another halt to call on 
the Turkish Governor, and here we were 
joined by the two soldiers whom the Governor 
compelled us to take. 



PETRA— THE WONDERFUL TEMPLE OF ED-DIER CARVED ENTIRELY 
OUT OF THE LIVING ROCK. THIS WONDERFUL DESERTED ROCK 
CITY IS 70 MILES N.E. OF THE GULF OF AHALA. 



'^PETRA" i6i 

After a long wait, during which we had 
to sit in the centre of one of the towns sur- 
rounded by the inquisitive people, we at last 
got under way for Petra. By the most direct 
route we should have passed no water, so we 
determined to go rather further round and 
have a picnic by an oasis. This we did, 
and much enjoyed a seven hours' ride across 
the desert, which towards the end became 
very hilly and even mountainous. 

Castle of Pharaoh's daughter, Petra by 
moonlight — I sit down perfectly stupefied 
when I think of describing this place. To 
say that it is wonderful, awe-inspiring, beauti- 
ful, is no true description ; many places 
are, I suppose, this, but Petra is unique. 

As we rode, or rather led, the horses on 
Friday afternoon down through a rugged, 
wild ravine, similar to those of the wildest 
parts of the Lake district, the sun began to 
dip between the hills, and, in spite of the 
grandeur of the rock scenery, we looked for- 
ward to camp. The ravine opened out as we 
clambered down, and suddenly, as we wound 
round the shoulder of the hill, the mountains 



i62 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

of Edom burst upon our eyes. Never shall 
I forget it. The hills we were crossing were 
of a grey, ordinary colour ; but the pile of 
rock, which was thus framed in grey, was 
composed of all the colours of the rainbow, 
at this distance blended as on an artist's 
palette into the most perfect hues of a sun- 
rise in the Alps. As the sun set behind 
this mass, it looked like a huge cinder still 
glowing; the rugged points just caught by 
the last rays of the sun faded from one soft 
colour to another like a dying flame, until as 
the daylight faded and the moon came out, 
the whole mass grew cold in its silver and 
black. 

Though we had fully intended to reach 
Petra that day, we came to the conclusion 
that it would be more beautiful and also 
more safe to go down into the mass of rock 
by daylight, so we pitched our camp in 
Wady Musa, close to the village of Elji, and 
just below it. 

Next morning we got up early, loaded 
the donkeys, and were quickly on the march 
down the valley. We soon reached a fine 
tomb with a huge decorated front and a 



*'PETRA" 163 

double colonnade before it, all carved out of 
the solid rock. After this the valley became 
more and more precipitous and the rocks 
full of tombs, until at last the torrent-bed 
turned sharp to the right and straight into 
the mountain, and we were in a narrow 
crack artificially widened at the bottom to 
about 10 feet, and with the cliffs on each side 
towering to some 300 feet, sometimes seem- 
ing to almost meet at the top. We had 
entered the mountains of Petra, which I 
ought first to describe in general. 

Surrounded by grassy hills which separate 
them from the great Arabian desert on the 
east, and by the sandhills which descend to 
the desert of Arabah, or great valley between 
the Dead Sea and the Gulf of Akabah on the 
west, they are of entirely different geological 
nature from the rest. They are one mighty 
heap of soft sandstone peaks, the highest of 
which is Mount Hor ; but the most remark- 
able thing about this craggy mass is, that the 
rock of which it is composed has in it a 
grain exactly like wood, sometimes in curving 
lines, sometimes twisted into knots just like 
mahogany, sometimes again in scales like 



i64 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

a mackerel skin, and every grain has its 
own particular colour ranging from polished 
jet black to the whiteness of snow, and in- 
cluding not only all the most brilliant colours 
of a paint-box, except green, but also all 
their soft silky tints as well. They are 
described as being mostly of a watered-silk 
appearance, but to me some seemed more 
like satin. 

After about three-quarters of a mile in 
this cleft in the rock we entered another and 
broader chasm at right angles. Here we 
suddenly came to the most beautiful and 
most perfecdy preserved of all the remains 
of Petra. It is a temple of Isis, cut out of 
the rock in the time of the Roman occupa- 
tion. I feel how hopeless it is to give you 
any idea of its grandeur and beauty. They 
selected a piece of the rock-face which was 
all of one hue, the lovely strawberry cream 
colour of a sunrise on the snow-clad Alps, 
and out of this face they cut the porch about 
1 20 feet high, consisting of two storeys, the 
first 60 feet long, supported by grand columns 
and the top part beautifully ornamented, cul- 
minating in an urn which the Arabs believe 



-PETRA" 165 

contains the treasures of the Pharaohs, hence 
they call it The Treasury of Pharaoh," all 
cut out of the solid rock. 

As we passed, we found several of them, 
as is their custom, shooting at the urn, hoping 
to chip some pieces off, with the idea that 
some day it will be broken, and all the con- 
tents fall to the ground. The interior of the 
temple, which, of course, is inside the moun- 
tain itself, consists of six rooms, three very 
large and three smaller, and is absolutely 
without decoration, but the stone is of the 
most exquisite colours imaginable. The sik 
down which we were going was the old en- 
trance to Petra, and though it was really 
water-worn, yet it had been paved, and the 
water had been confined to one side by 
means of an old aqueduct ; some of this work 
still remains, as also the remains of a trium- 
phal archway, which had spanned the sik at 
its entrance. We then emerged suddenly 
on to a low undulating plain about half a 
mile across, shut in by huge vertical cliffs. 
This is Petra. 

The wady continued across the plain and 
out by another sik of possibly greater 



i66 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

magnificence on the other side. As to the 
place itself, Petra was the capital and centre of 
Edom, which nation lived in these moun- 
tains south of Moab and no doubt extended 
out to the outlying oases in the Desert of 
Arabia in the east and of Arabah or Desert 
of Zin on the west. The Edomites were 
naturally proud of their apparently impass- 
able frontier. No wonder the Israelites, who 
pushed their way through the other tribes, 
here asked for permission, and, when refused, 
went all round (Num. xx. 19). The sik 
down which we went is the only possible 
passage through this barrier of rock ; it is 
obviously the highway" of ver. 19. As 
this is only 10 feet wide in parts, it certainly 
was a question of permission or else going 
round (ver. 19). They would pay for the 
water ! Why ? Water in Petra is precious. 
In the ruins there is a most wonderful system 
for conveying and preserving water by aque- 
ducts, reservoirs, etc. Now that they are 
not in working order, it is very scarce. The 
first thing I did after pitching our camp was 
to dig with my hands in the sand a little 
hole large enough to collect the little trickle, 



^*PETRA" 167 

that we might have sufficient for a wash. 
The Edomites refused, and the poor Israel- 
ites went away disappointed. While we 
were staying there, we did all we could to 
persuade the Governor of the district to 
allow us to go up Mount Hor, which is the 
highest of the mountains of Petra and on 
the border (Num. xx. 22). 

We wanted to go up and see the Tomb 
of Aaron, which is a Moslem sacred place. 
We asked that we might be allowed to go 
straight up and down " without doing any- 
thing else to go on our feet," but he said, 
"Thou shalt not go " (vers. 19, 20), and we had 
to turn away disappointed. As they climbed 
Mount Hor and looked down so we climbed 
the Mounts of Petra and looked across at 
Aaron's tomb, which is built exactly on the 
top of Mount Hor (Num. xx. 28). The 
Israelites could do nothing against those that 
dwelt in the " clefts of the rock." Petra — 
rock (Jer. xlix. 16) is a most perfect descrip- 
tion. You cannot imagine what force such 
a verse as Jer. xlix. 10 has, when you stand 
on the top of one rock-altar after another 
built on the high places ; yes, stand on the 



i68 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

actual altars themselves and climb up the 
sacred pillars (secret places) and see around 
you not a person, not a tree, or shrub, except 
the oleander bush down in the dry bed of 
the stream, everywhere nothing but rock. 

The principal tombs and temples of Petra 
must be described in several books, so I 
need not attempt to describe them here. 
There are more than 750 of them, many 
being enormous, some plain, others beauti- 
fully decorated with columns, pilasters, urns, 
and decorative moulding. Just a very few 
have had statuary; but in all cases, as is 
the Moslem custom, the heads have been 
knocked off. 

One of the finest temples had at one time 
been used as a church, and a small Greek 
inscription had been painted on the back 
wall. One tomb of the Governor had a 
Latin inscription. Another one much older 
had a perfect inscription in Nabateen writing. 
These are all the inscriptions mentioned in 
guide-books, but in the west sik or entrance, 
where it had been made artificially wider, 
Mr. H — had found a few words also of 
Nabateen roughly chipped by the hewers 



^'PETRA" 



169 



We found some more, which I believe had 
not been read before, and we brought back a 
copy ; it was under a huge boulder. 

There is a very striking similarity to 
Hebrew, many of the letters being decidedly 
the same. To me the most interesting thing 




was a Semitic high place " quite complete 
and perfect. It did not strike one as being 
a thing of the past, it was so perfect. We 
had a stiff real rock climb up the face of one 
of the crags, occasionally being assisted by 
the remains of flights of steps up which the 
worshippers no doubt used to ascend. After 
climbing from one beautiful grotto or terrace 
to another, we suddenly found ourselves face 

M 



I70 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

to face near the top with two huge pillars, 
which were really a part of the mountain 
which had been left standing when the sur- 
rounding rock had been cut away. They 
were each about 25 feet high. I had read 
of the pillars connected with Semitic worship, 
and am glad to say managed to get a good 



□ 



A. Courtyard cut down into rock about 2 feet deep. 

B. Grand altar about 6 feet by 4. 

C. Steps up to altar. 

D. Low platform. 

E. Circular basin with tubular drain leading off from the 

centre. 

F. Cistern. 

G. Spot from which the photo was taken. 

photo of one. They are mentioned in 
Deut. xii. 3. 

Close to these was the ruin of a Crusader's 
castle which seemed centuries away from 



^^PETRA" 171 

everything else at Petra, and then just on 
the actual top was the real high place. 

On the Tuesday we went for an excursion 
up to El Deir (" The Convent "), an exceed- 
ingly grand temple, cut near the top of one 
of the mountains on the west sik. The 
climb was very considerable, especially in 
the heat, but we were very well repaid. 
The temple front was enormous, .the door- 
step being up to my chin, but in this case it 
was not so much the temple that took our 
fancy as the view to the west. We could 
see down over the mountain sides for many 
miles, right to the great Desert of Arabah, 
with the Gulf of Akaba on the south and the 
Dead Sea on the north. For a desert view 
it was superb, but it had not the interest of 
the one from Pisgah. In the afternoon we 
went down the west " sik " or entrance to 
Petra. Here as everywhere the scenery 
was grand. There was mostly more room 
than in the east sik ; here was a spring of 
water and a waterfall and pool deep enough 
to bathe in. We were not long getting in, 
and quite astounded the Arab with us by 
our being able to float. He was afterwards 



172 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

overheard telling the soldiers. He was a 
native of the nearest village named Mossa 
or Moses, and the Arabic name for Petra is 
Wady Moosa or Valley of Moses. This 
spring, which is really only the re-appearance 
of the one we had passed on our way into 
Petra, is supposed by the Arabs to be one 
obtained by Moses from the rock. One 
never knows what truth there may be at 
the back of such traditions, but the circum- 
stances are interesting. It certainly does 
flow out from a big rock in the hillside. 
This district is the district of rock in a 
special sense, hence it is called Petra. 

Since returning I have spoken of this to 
a Rabbi I know here. He said, It is a 
foolish tradition. That rock we are told in 
the Talmud followed the Israelites into the 
promised land, and it is now settled down 
near Acre." I told him of the quotation in 
the New Testament, " The rock which 
followed them was Christ." 

As there were a large number of part- 
ridges about, we went out in the early morn- 
ing to shoot some, but with very indifferent 
success. 



RAMULLA 



RAMULLA 



It certainly can be hot here. The last 
three days have been testers. I have been 
in a bath of perspiration all day long, and 
after lunch every one goes straight to lie 
down. One sleeps heavily till 3 p.m., 
waking up with a heavy sort of feeling 
which two cups of tea are hardly sufficient 
to remove. 

I got back this morning from' a very plea- 
sant week enci spent at Ramulla, 10 miles 
from here (the supposed place from which 
Joseph and Mary turned back), where I had 
gone on Saturday afternoon to take the 
Sunday services. 

The L.J.S. girls' boarding school were 
staying there for their fortnight's holiday. 
They gave me a very good time, though 
I was much in the minority, as there were 
forty-five girls, two mistresses, and two 
other English ladies. The inn was crowded 

175 



176 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

and I had to sleep out in a tent, which 

was very pleasant. Miss B was going 

over to the wedding of the cousin of their 
servant, which was also taking place yester- 
day, so we and the servant secured the 
inside of a public carriage. It was rather 
amusing as we travelled decorating the 
servant up in all the wedding finery. The 
women turn all their money into head- 
dresses of coins and bangles, etc. ; so much 
so that nearly every local coin is pierced 
with a hole. The head-dress in question 
had about worth of coins on, fastened 
by a silver chain. She had six massive and 
solid silver bracelets on each arm, six rings, 
beside pendants, earrings, etc. The ser- 
vants husband, like many here, has gone 
off to America fortune-hunting, and neveV 
writes, so that she does not know anything 
of him. I was glad to accept an invitation 
to the wedding ceremony, as I had not been 
to a Greek marriage. They had been 
having feasting for a week, and we went 
down in the evening to see the dancing. 
We entered the house of the bridegroom*s 
people, where we first watched the women 



RAMULLA 177 

dance in one of the rooms, while they con- 
tinually sang songs of welcome to the guests, 
and fed us with melon seeds soaked in salt 
and dried. The dance was of the Highland 
type, but much slower and very graceful, 
the time being supplied by clapping the 
hands. Afterwards we were provided with 
chairs in the courtyard. Here was a still 
more weird sight, there were more cries of 
welcome, screamingly funny, and then we 
were provided with chairs at the head of 
the courtyard. The flat roof was crowded 
all round with women all squatting, as also 
the stairs leading up to it. The men were 
in a jolly crowd down below. Nothing could 
have looked more Eastern but for the 
**Lux" lamp, a brilliant petroleum arc lamp 
on the Primus " principle, which had been 
temporarily suspended in the court. The 
dance of the men was more curious than I 
could have imagined. It was more of the 

Sir Roger" type, either side singing in 
antiphon and clapping alternately. It was 
awfully fine. 

The next afternoon three or four of us 
went down to the Greek church to see the 



178 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

actual wedding service. The bridegroom 
was enthroned outside the church door, 
and the court was crowded with people, 
the women doing " a ring a ring of roses 
type of dance. Suddenly there was a stir 
in the crowd and three boys pushed their 
way through, carrying floral branches, fol- 
lowed by four Greek priests, and then the 
bride, led by her father and uncle, who were 
in rags, to signify mourning at their loss ; 
her veils were so thick that you could not 
see either face, head, or shoulders. Amidst 
tremendous enthusiasm the two were led 
into the church by the priest. The man 
is not supposed to take any interest in the 
affair, but to always turn away from his 
bride and look as morbidly dejected as 
possible, and if he has elder brothers un- 
married, even to weep. Our bridegroom 
was beyond everything successful ; he hung 
his head down and looked as if he would 
be sick (which the bride was, all down the 
inside of her veil), whilst the best man 
mopped his perspiring face with a rag, 
which looked as if it had been used for 
cleaning engines. 



RAMULLA 179 

Small white crowns, very much awry, 
were put on each head, and then inter- 
changed, from which the service gets the 
name of "the crowning." A woman stood 
behind continually sewing their clothes to- 
gether with needle and thread, but as there 
was no knot the thread always pulled 
through. Each was given a ring. The 
Gospel was read in Arabic and Greek, the 
book resting partly on one head and partly 
on the other. There was an administration 
of reserved Sacrament administered entirely 
with a teaspoon. They were dragged three 
times sideways round the Table, which stood 
in the centre of the church, surrounded by 
the crowd. The bridegroom was lifted three 
times by the best man and let fall again, and 
then the babble of the crowd turned into 
a mighty roar, pistols and crackers were 
fired. The bride fainted, and the priests 
fought their way out with a free use of their 
fists. The bridegroom also cleared off 
apparently in disgust, leaving ourselves, a 
few women, and a Syrian doctor to attend 
to the bride. The doctor lifted her veil and 
threw cold water in her face. She looked 



i8o ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

absolutely deadly. However, a few moments 
later she had joined the bridegroom outside, 
and went off surrounded by dancing and 
joyful women. 

This was a Greek Christian wedding, but 
I think in many respects it is much like a 
Moslem one. A Russian one I saw later 
was somewhat similar but more decorous. 
I rode back early on Monday on a donkey 
with a lady's saddle, and kept as much as 
possible with a carriage, as several times 
lately people have been held up on this 
road. Only last week a carriage horse was 
shot and all the people robbed. Sometimes 
men turn up at home with nothing but 
trousers left. I have never heard of an 
Englishman being shot. 



WADY KELT 



WADY KELT 



The Brook Cherith 

Aug. 2otL — To-day we start for camp at the 
brook Cherith. We go down the Jericho 
road past the Good Samaritan inn to about 
three and a half hours' distance, and then 
over a hill to the left and down into the 
chasm where Elijah was fed by the ravens. 
W e shall not rely on ravens, but hope to get 
plenty of fish and partridges. We expect 
to be away ten days. 

Aug. 2 1^/.— This is a jolly place, and we 
are now well settled in. We came down 
about 2 200 feet, or nearly to the sea-level, 
only on the Jordan side of the hills, and are 
camped in an orange and lemon garden on 
the bank of the stream, where the wady, 
which is mostly narrow and precipitous, 
widens out for a short space. The vege- 
tation wherever there is water is luxuriant 

18 



i84 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

in the extreme, part of the stream being 
hidden in an absolutely impenetrable jungle 
of 15-feet reeds; here and there there is a 
banana palm or pomegranate tree, above my 
head a fig tree, and across the stream a 
shady bower covered with a fruitful vine. 

Above all this are the absolutely dry, 
brown hills of the Judsean desert. These 
hills need not be so barren. Where one 
aqueduct runs along them from higher 
up the stream, there is as here abundant 
vegetation. There are also everywhere 
remains of old Roman aqueducts, which 
make it look as if once this must have been 
a prosperous valley. It's just the water 
which makes this such an ideal camping- 
ground, and one can easily understand 
Elisha hiding here. Just above us, about 
30 feet up the face of the rock, are four large 
caves, once used by the hermits, now lived 
in by the family who look after this place. 
Perhaps the prophet lived in a cave like 
these ? 

But something has happened since I 
began this letter which still more reminds 
me of him. On Thursday morning when 



WADY KELT 185 

Mr. H returned from shooting with his 

faithful friend, a dear old Arab who is living 
here with us, we were down at the pool 
bathing when the effendi, or man to whom 
all this belongs, came down to say that during 
the night there had been a quarrel down by 
the Dead Sea, and that the old man's cousin 
who had been in prison before for murder, 
had killed a man of another family. Blood 
demands blood, and since it is known that 
the old man is here, he has had to go away 
and hide further down, just like the prophet 
hiding from Ahab. If possible he hopes to 
escape across the Jordan Valley, as David 
did from Absalom.* Above here, in the time 
of the Romans, a wall was built across where 
the sheer rock in the narrow ravine descends 
straight into the stream, which still holds the 
water back, making a fine long winding 
pool. In this spot we all spend most of our 
mornings. It is about 60 yards long, and in 

* The old man who had to flee for the blood feud has 
come back. He met his would-be murderer with a rifle 
close to the camp waiting for him ; however, he luckily saw 
the enemy first and escaped. He crossed the Jordan and 
went over the mountains to his clan near Ammon. Here he 
found it was all a mistake, and his tribe was not imphcated. 
A message was sent, and he took fifteen hours walking back 

N 



i86 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

parts well out of our depth. Camp life is 
the same here as everywhere, bathing, 
feeding, reading, sleeping, etc., sing-song 
and games in the evening. 

It is very wonderful how careful the 
Moslems are now that it is their fast of 
Ramadan. They may neither eat nor drink 
while the sun is in the sky, they work all 
day long in this heat, and will not even dip 
their faces in the stream lest they should get 
a drop in the mouth. The soldiers will put 
them in prison if they catch them eating or 
smoking. Most keep the fast, but some eat 
and drink on the sly. 

Tuesday, Sept, lytk, — Off for Galilee. We 
left Jerusalem yesterday for the north. As 
usual there was a tremendous rush at Jaffa 
down to the wharf; but we had Cooks 
tickets, and were soon in his boat dancing 
over the rippling waves, rowed along by ten 
strong natives to their own particular chant. 
We shot through the gap in the rocks and 
out to the steamer Saidiaky of the Khedival 
line. Most of the way the coast was much 
like Cromer-Sheringham, just sandy cliffs 



GALILEE i8; 

with the level plain behind, and the Judaean 
hills in the distance. Gradually these 
seemed to approach the shore until soon 
after we passed Csesarea (which looked like 
a large heap of ruins) there were but a few 
yards of plain left between the hills and the 
sea, and I knew we were under Carmel. 
We then made a wide sweep out to sea to 
avoid rocks, and turned in to this glorious 
bay. We were soon rowed ashore and put 
into a conveyance. Here we had to cling to 
each other and to the carriage while rattling 
along over the most awful cobble-stones, 
through the old streets and market of Haifa, 
and then through a German colony right up 
a precipitous and zigzag road to this fine 
hostel, kept by a German pastor right on 
the top of Carmel. It is difficult to compare 
one view with another, but of its kind I have 
never seen anything finer. Below my 
window is a very steep drop of 700 feet, 
covered with vines and finishing in a slope 
of 200 feet more, on which Haifa is built. 
The old town is composed of white, flat- 
roofed houses and minarets, the new one 
of pretty red-tiled bungalows, with large 



i88 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

verandahs and creepers. Beyond this is the 
blue water of the Mediterranean, which as 
I look down is covered with little boats. 

Across the bay is Acre, and behind that 
the mountain called the Ladder of Tyre. 
All the distance is filled in by the beginning 
of the great Lebanon range and beyond, 
dimly seen, the snow peak of Hermon. 
Pastor Schneider calls this place "a home 
for missionaries," of whom there are several 
staying now for a few days. We have 
prayers half in English and half in German. 
These missionaries are returning shortly to 
their various stations, but owing to the fear 
of quarantine on the railway, we are to share 
a carriage instead of going by train. 

Our first day here we climbed down into 
Haifa, nine of us, and then separated up as 
we all had things to do. I went to the 
bathing-place of the German colony, and 
had a swim in the sea, and then made 
inquiries for a boy who left the L.J.S. 
school last term, and is seeking employ- 
ment here. Fortunately I found him almost 
at once, and went to see his family. They 
seemed highly delighted. The whole family 



GALILEE 189 

is now Christian, the mother and sister 
having both been at the L.J.S. girls* school. 
After Turkish coffee I went for a short 
stroll. 

Wednesday we took our lunch with us, 
and climbing down again into Haifa got a 
brake and drove all along the foot of Carmel, 
inland by the side of that ancient river the 
river Kishon" which (when it flows at all) 
flows through the absolutely level plain 
stretching from the sea at the foot of the 
mountain to drop into the Jordan Valley. 
At first this plain is about 10 miles wide, 
but after 10 miles it narrows down to a few 
hundred yards, and then opens out again 
into the great Plain of Esdraelon. All along 
its south side run the cliffs of Carmel for 
1 6 miles, occasionally broken by ravines and 
covered everywhere between the rocks with 
green trees (the guide-book says Carmel is 
often used in prophecy as a sign of fruitful- 
ness), then the cliffs turn sharp to the right 
towards the sea, thus forming a huge triangle. 
To this corner we drove, as here is un- 
doubtedly the spot where Elijah made his 
great stand for righteousness. At the foot 



I90 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

of the mountain the dry bed of the Kishon 
which winds about in the plain takes a turn 
quite close up, and here is a small hill where 
no doubt the prophets of Baal were slain. 
We climbed 1600 feet and got a splendid 
view over Esdraelon to Nazareth, Gilboa, 
Little Hermon, etc. About three-quarters 
of the way up is a kind of platform on the 
hillside, with a very old well to which all 
the shepherds bring their flocks. As this is 
the only spring in the neighbourhood, and 
as there had been no rain for so long, the 
people would have encamped here, and from 
it the water would be drawn for the sacrifice. 
The altar of Baal would probably be upon 
the top of the mountain. 

Afterwards w^e climbed to the summit, 
and stood, as Gehazi had, and looked towards 
the sea, which was visible in the distance 
reaching right down to Jaffa. Here there is 
a monastery of Carmelites ; they were very 
kind in showing us over and giving us tea. 
Across the plain we could see Jezreel, to 
which Elijah ran before the chariot of Ahab. 

On Thursday evening we arrived at the 
hotel Germanis Nazareth. What I have 



GALILEE 191 

seen so far here is not very attractive ; it is 
a large place covering several hills and con- 
sisting of large convents and monasteries, 
their grounds surrounded by high walls. 
There are also hotels, orphanages, a hospital, 
etc. On our way we passed through a large 
forest of oak trees, and descended into the 
plain. At this season it is extremely dry, 
and at many places where the ground is 
hard it is all cracked in the sun ; in others, 
the dust is several inches thick. What it 
must be like after rain you can imagine 
from the fact that conveyances have to go 
slowly with men behind, scraping the clods 
of mud off the wheels. Sometimes people 
have to get out and wade through the mire. 
No wonder Elijah told Ahab to make haste 
across to Jezreel as there was the sound of 
rain, and no wonder that the nine hundred 
chariots of Sisera were no use against 
Deborah and Barak (Judg. iv. 3), espe- 
cially as the river Kishon which in summer 
is dry was in flood (Judg. v. 21). No wonder 
Sisera got down from his chariot and went 
on his feet like many a tourist has since 
had to do. 



192 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

The Turkish post is like everything 
Turkish, absolutely rotten. People say that 
nothing of value ever arrives by it, and in 
out-of-the-way places like Safed, they have 
to try all sorts of dodges, as there are only 
Turkish mails. When they order news- 
papers they have to get them wrapped up 
as parcels, or they do not arrive, and when 
they order boots they have them sent one 
at a time, so that they are no use to the 
postman. 

Later — Nazareth greatly improves on 
acquaintance, as it is surrounded by high 
hills which you can climb up, and these 
blocking out all the awful buildings, one 
can think of the country and its past. The 
Edinburgh medical mission have a hospital 
here with a staff of two doctors and two 
nurses ; they are doing a splendid work. 
On Friday we arranged to spend the day 
on Mount Tabor. About lo a.m. five of 
us left the hospital on horseback, and in 
two hours or less were ascending its very 
steep side. Tabor can easily be seen from 
Nazareth, being a peculiarly isolated moun- 
tain at the end of the Nazareth ridge, which 



GALILEE 



193 



rises abruptly all along the north side of the 
plain of Esdraelon. 

We only had three wadies to cross, and 
then went by the zigzag path of the pilgrims 
up to the top. Here there are as usual 
both a Greek (Russian) and a Latin place, 




Meron 



Nazsr^Hi ^S^i^ Galilee 



t,.(2armel 



P/&/n or 



each owning half the almost flat summit of 
the mountain, in keen rivalry each claiming 
that they have the true site. The Russians 
put up and feed the pilgrims with no charge, 
while the Latins have more idea of busi- 
ness, and make a fixed charge of ten francs 
a night. It seems to be £^ paying concern 



194 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

as they have done a lot of excavating in 
their grounds, and found the remains of an 
old crusading church, etc. (These Latins 
never seem to want money.) The view from 
the top, which is about 1800 feet, is very 
fine. On all sides the mountain descends 
steeply, and you can walk to the edge and 
look down over the country as over a map. 
On one side is the great plain (Esdraelon) 
with Carmel, the mountains of Samaria and 
Gilboa in the background; then where the 
plain slopes towards Jordan through the 
vale of Jezreel, there rises Little Hermon 
with Nain and Endor at its foot. On the 
north were the hills of Safed with the town 
itself perched on the top, some 20 miles 
away, and down on the right the Horns of 
Hattin, with, just beyond, a little blue patch 
of Galilee backed by the rough peaks of the 
Hauran, and, like a cloud on the dim distance, 
the stately " Hermon," or Mount of the 
Chief," so called because of its predominance 
and its white head. It is in Syria, but, 
being 10,000 feet high, can be seen far down 
into Palestine, even to Jericho. Here we 
had lunch, and read the passage concerning 



GALILEE 195 

Barak, who rushed down upon the plain with 
10,000 men (cf. Judges). This is supposed 
to be the mountain of the Transfiguration, 
and it does seem to suit the story. The 
argument against it is that there was a 
Roman fort on the top, but this seems to be 
of little force as the summit is so large. 

We wandered about a bit, and then rode 
back in time to see the sun setting just as 
we reached Nazareth. On Sunday we saw 
something of the C.M.S. work, with which 
I was very much struck. In the morning 
we went to their church, which is a very nice 
building, and found it quite full of natives. 
They had a very hearty service in Arabic 
conducted by two native pastors ; one of 
them preached what seemed to be a wonder- 
ful sermon, in which he appeared to refer 
to every part of the Bible. On coming out 
I met a fellow who had just left the C.M.S. 
College at Jerusalem, whom I know. He 
showed me the traditional synagogue where 
Jesus preached, which is now a Latin chapel. 
It did not look convincing, as, apparently, 
every part visible had been renewed. We 
then went into the Church of Annunciation 



196 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

(Latin) and saw the spot where the angel 
stood, and also into a cave known as " Mary's 
kitchen." In the afternoon we went to the 
orphanage, where I had promised to take an 
English service. Here, for a great many 
years, the C.M.S. have taken in and trained 
as teachers orphan girls from all parts of the 
country, their average number being between 
seventy and ninety, and from here, as from 
their training institute at Bethlehem, they 
send out Christian teachers to hold little 
classes in the villages up and down Palestine. 
It seems to me that such an organization 
must be having a great effect. Like several 
other institutions here this one seems to 
have been founded by some one who later 
on handed it over to the C.M.S. The girls 
were all away for the holidays, but the 
service was attended by the doctor and 
nurse, the three ladies at the orphanage, and 
our party. Afterwards we enjoyed a fine 
view over Nazareth from the balcony, and 
descended the 150 steps to the town. Later 
we saw the Virgin's fount, or the spring 
(being the only one) from which Mary must 
have carried water. Here, in autumn, it is 



GALILEE 197 

sometimes so difficult to get water that 
soldiers have to be on guard night and day 
to keep order. 

The next day we started at 5.30 a.m. to 
drive to Safed. We went up the hill at 
Nazareth and down into the valley to the 
north, soon halting by a spring just outside 
Cana. It must have been over this hill that 
our Lord and His mother walked to the 
marriage, and probably the water of the 
miracle would have been drawn from the 
spring. Several women came with huge 
black earthenware jars, and filled them. We 
walked up to the village, going into the 
church to look at the exact spot where they 
say the six jars stood, and a model in wood 
of what they looked like. I believe some- 
where they are supposed to have the real 
jars, but we felt quite glad that we were not 
dragged off by the priest to go and see them, 
One gets absolutely disgusted with these 
things and longs to be outside on the hills, 
where one really sees the country itself. 
Going through the village we were mobbed 
by girls and women wanting to sell lace 
until the doctor had to swing his riding- 



198 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

whip round in order to get to the carriage. 
They were much amused by my copying 
them, and waving my handkerchief in their 
faces offering it for two francs. From Cana 
we drove to another village called Lubia, and 
soon passed close to the top of a curious hill 

called " The Horns 
of Hattin,'* just where 
the road drops sud- 
denly down to the lake 
of Galilee, which is 600 feet below the sea- 
level, hence on that side it is quite a high 
mountain. It is generally considered to be 
the site of the " Sermon on the Mount." 
As we came over its slope we suddenly 
saw below us the whole lake of Galilee, a 
beautiful calm sheet of blue water looking 
like a mirror set in a frame of mountains 
reflecting the clear sky above. 

" A little ship was on the sea, 
It was a pretty sight." 

Unfortunately for the poetry of the scene 
it turned out to be a small steamer which 
goes the length of the lake each day. 
It was on the mountain of the Beatitudes 




GALILEE 199 

that the Crusaders made their last great 
stand when they were defeated by Saladin. 
They had been forced to camp the night 
before in a valley close by, where there was 
no water ; no wonder they were defeated. 

From here we descended by the steep 
road down to Tiberias on the shore of the 
lake ; we did not stop, but drove straight 
through, and all along the lakeside for an 
hour, at the foot of the mountains to 
Mejdel, ue, Magdala. Once a big Jewish 
town, after centuries of ruin it is now being 
revived like almost every place in Galilee by 
a Jewish colony. These little settlements 
are a wonderful feature of this country, all 
over the hills where for centuries there has 
been nothing but the ruins of past civilization 
>^nd the little mud villages of the Arabs. 
Now you see rows of bungalows with red- 
tiled roofs surrounded with neat gardens. 
They seem to be able to grow anything. 
One can easily see what a wonderfully fertile 
country this might, and no doubt will be. 
Thistles and thorns cover the land (there 
are flowers in the spring), but wherever 
men turn the soil over and plant things, 



200 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

there it becomes like a garden of Eden. 
The Jews are extremely industrious, and 
at Magdala we found cement works where 
they make pipes for water supply and 
irrigation. It is situated at the beginning 
of the plain of Gennesaret, which is an 
exceptionally fertile plain on the north-west 
side of the lake, with copious springs of 
water all over it. Here we got out of the 
carriage and found horses sent down for us 
from Safed. We sat by the blue waters of 
the lake and had lunch, then filled our 
pockets with little shells, after which we 
began our great climb up to Safed, which 
we could see on the mountain above. Galilee 
is 600 feet below and Safed about 2700 feet 
above sea-level, so you can see it is a good 
climb. We left the lake at 2 p.m., and did 
not reach our destination till sunset. The 
town itself being situated right up on the top 
of the mountain overlooking the lake in 
such a conspicuous position, seems to have 
suggested the words, A city set on a hill 
cannot be hid," but if that is so, we might 
add cannot be hid by man," for as we left 
Galilee the clouds rolled over the mountain 



GALILEE 



20I 



and entirely blotted it out, I stopped at 

Dr. M ^"s house just outside the town on 

the slope of the hill looking south towards 
the lake ; the view from his balcony is said 
to be the most extensive from any European 
house in Palestine. You can see the whole 
of the Sea of Galilee at the foot of the 
mountain, over 3000 feet below, just like 
a map, and beyond that the Jordan Valley, 
in clear weather down as far as the mountains 
overhanging the Dead Sea. To the west 
you look straight over the mountains of the 
lake to Nazareth and Tabor, and even over 
there and across Esdraelon to the hills of 
Samaria, Ebal, and Gerizim (three days' 
journey away) and again still more to the 
west you can see right over to Carmel with 
its 16 miles of mountain from the place 
of sacrifice to the sea. Seeing this view for 
a week at sunrise, sunset, and full moon, I 
feel that I got a grasp of the geography such 
as I can never forget. 

After two days' rest we procured horses 
and rode over to Mount Jermak, which is 
1000 feet higher — indeed, the highest point 
in Palestine proper. Here we had the same 

o 



202 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

view, only much more so, as it included also 
the sea, Haifa, Acre, Tyre, etc. ; northward 
Lebanon, the Anti-Lebanon Hermon, waters 
of Merom, and the desert towards Damascus. 
Safed is built on the top of a mountain ; the 
actual summit is occupied by the ruins of an 
old crusading castle, and the town clusters 
all round this. It is so steep that the roads 
or passages often pass along the roofs of the 
streets below. It is a very large place and 
populated mainly by Jews. It is nowhere 
mentioned in the Bible, and does not seern 
to have had much importance till the time 
of the great Jewish Rabbis, two or three of 
whom are buried close by. Since then it 
became a Jewish University, and is now one 
of the four sacred cities, the others being 
Jerusalem, Hebron (Judaea), and Tiberias. 
Years ago (1837?) there was a bad earth- 
quake here, which destroyed nearly every 
house in the place, and small earthquakes are 

now very common. Dr. A 's house, only 

finished last year, has unfortunately been so 
badly cracked that it is not considered safe 
to live in. 

The Rev. F — — , who lives near here, was 



GALILEE 203 

a Russian Jew from Odessa, and as a boy 
was sent to Safed partly to study and partly 
for health. Here he studied the Talmud, 
etc., but on a visit to Jerusalem came in 
touch with our Mission, and became a 
Christian. After some training he returned 
as a missionary to Safed, where the Jews 
were so fanatical that no previous one had 
been able to live amongst them. His sister 
afterwards became a convert. He married 
a missionary, and these three, with his sister- 
in-law, have worked here for years. He 
cannot 'go to the Jewish houses now, having 
injured his leg, but seems to receive a 
constant stream of callers into his house, and 
I am told that there are also those who 
like Nicodemus come under cover of dark- 
ness. He is universally respected, and both 
Jews and Moslems bring their disputes to 
him to settle. He says that the Jews are 
openly working against the mission to an 
extent which he has never known before. 
I hear the same everywhere. We have 
been seeing the curious booths which the 
Jews all over the world make during the 
Feast of Tabernacles. In many cases they 



204 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

had real booths either on the roof or against 
the wall of the house. In some cases they 
had only put branches over the roof, re- 
moving the ceiling ; in others, they did not 
even remove this. 

After our visit to Jebel Jermak we 
descended to a place called Meirom, five 
miles from Safed, but divided from it by a 
deep ravine. It is of great interest, because 
here are the tombs of the great Rabbis 
Hillel and Simeon. In the spring the Jews 
come in great number on pilgrimage to the 
place, which, apart from this shrine, is only 
a tiny village. Last spring a number were 
killed, being crushed off the roof by the 
crowd and falling upon those in the court 
below. They were brought to Safed, and 
died after lying for days untended on a 
stone floor, as their friends would not allow 
them to enter our hospital. The tombs of 
the Rabbis are just whitewashed domes in 
a comparatively modern building, and like 
the Greek holy places are lit up by suspended 
brass candlesticks, burning wicks floating in 
olive oil. 

There are also at Meirom the ruins of a 



GALILEE 205 

really old synagogue, probably B.C., but there 
is not much left except the doorway and floor. 

The next day we rested. I determined 
not to go to Damascus as many travellers 
do, because I wanted to get to know one 
country well. Besides this, as it happened 
all Syria was in quarantine, and there would' 
have been much difficulty in getting back. 
I just spent the day in wandering over the 
Galilean hills. The following morning three 
of us started off on horseback before sunrise 
to see the Lake of Merom. We descended 
by a very steep path into the valley of the 
Jordan and then galloped over the plain to 
the south end of the lake. Horses here do 
not trot or canter, they either walk fast over 
the rough tracks, picking their way between 
the rocks, or when they do. reach an open 
and level stretch like their native desert, 
gallop madly for the sheer joy of the sensa- 
tion. You should have seen us going over 
the plain that morning. I have learnt to 
ride like the natives, getting free of the 
stirrups, crouching down and gripping on to 
the horse's flanks with my heels. My ! ! ! it 
was grand. 



2o6 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

The lake itself is quite small compared 
with Galilee and is not unlike Wroxham 
Broad. It is quite shallow, the bottom being 
overgrown with vegetation. Towards the 
entrance of the Jordan it is covered with 
floating weeds and water-lilies, and all that 
side is simply one mass of papyrus reeds so 




. \ Secf'ion 



thick one cannot push through. These grow 
from 8 to lo feet high ; they are very easily 
cut through, but even a thin strip of the pith 
we were unable to break. 

As we rode through the Jewish colony on 
the south-west side, which is just like a 
garden city, we could hear them chanting 



GALILEE 207 

their liturgy in the synagogue. It was their 
Sabbath. Many of them came out as we 
passed to look at us, still chanting away and 
swinging their bodies to and fro. Luckily 
it was their holy day or the one boat would 
otherwise have been engaged fishing, but 
the Jews won't buy fish on the Sabbath, 
and in this climate it can't be kept. Two 
Arabs were sitting by the shore, but the 
boat was on the other side. However, by 
the time that we had lit our fire and had 
breakfast it had been brought across, and 
we went for a row. The water was so 
shallow that we had to be carried out. 
We rowed up to the north end, and then 
quanted through the water-lilies into the 
narrow channel of the Jordan. By this time 
it had become very hot, and whilst rowing 
back we managed to get a good swim. It 
had been fairly clear all day, but as the sun 
declined the mountains became intensely 
distinct. Such a peaceful scene one could 
hardly imagine. In the foreground the 
absolutely still surface of the mere with a 
few cows standing knee-deep in the water, 
beyond was the great valley of the Jordan, 



2o8 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

with the purple Lebanon on one side, and 
on the other the great mass of snow-capped 
Hermon. It was up this valley that our 
Lord retired for rest with His disciples, 
and here St. Peter made his great con- 
fession. It is to the Lebanon that the 
missionaries now go for a change in the 
middle of the summer. As we rode away 
southward over the plain we kept turning 
back to see the view, until we reached the 
mountain gorge up which we had to ascend. 
The sun had set and the light quickly faded 
out of the sky. This wady is very steep, 
and is notorious for robbers, there being a 
big hole halfway up called the witches' 
cave, where they often hide. At Meirom 
we had met a man who had been attacked 
the night before, who managed to escape 
with only a few bruises. However, with 
three of us together we did not fear much. 
We rode at short distances apart, so that in 
the twists of the wady it could not be seen 
how many we were, and I rode in front with 
a papyrus roughly cut to look like a gun 
in the dark, and G. N — — had a revolver 
at the back. 



GALILEE 209 

Just as we came to the witches' cave we 
passed two or three men. They watched 
us go by in silence without giving the 
ordinary salute, and soon after we emerged 
at the top of the wady, to find the moon 
had risen, and in the distance on a further 
hill were the lights of Safed. That evening 
on the balcony I caught a fine specimen of 
a scorpion. If annoyed these creatures can 
sting, and though it is seldom fatal, yet the 
person can be paralysed for twenty-four 
hours. We also saw several snakes ; two 
big ones nearly two yards long were lying 
dead by the road, evidently having been 
killed by the natives. These snakes are 
mostly harmless, though not all of them. 

On Sunday we rested. At present they 
have no Hebrew service, as any Jew show- 
ing signs of being an inquirer has to leave 
the neighbourhood ; but in the schools they 
hold a little English service, at which I 
spoke. They are building a church. We 
needed our Sunday rest, as we had another 
hard day before us : Safed, mouth of Jordan, 
Tel Hum, Tabegah, Tiberias, Semach by 
steamboat, and Haifa by train. The ordinary 



210 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

way to Tiberias is by horse direct to 
where you catch the little steamboat, but 
we got up very early, rode down to the 
Jordan and along the north side of the 
lake to catch the boat at Tabegah. On 
this shore in the time of our Lord there 
seems to have been a large Jewish popula- 
tion. Where it was thickest there the place 
had a name, such as Bethsaida, Capernaum, 
Magdala, etc. *'A desert place" (Matt, 
xiv. 13), I suppose, simply means where no 
people lived (13 and 15 mention cities and 
villages). At that time the Jews would not 
enter Tiberias, as it was a newly built 
Roman town, which they said was put up 
over a graveyard. It has since, however, 
become one of their sacred places. Magdala 
(Mejdel) is a new Jewish colony, and I 
expect they will once more soon spread 
along this northern coast, where at present 
there are only about four houses. It was 
on this shore that our Lord spent so much 
time. At 5 a.m. we had a good start, 
and began riding by the moonlight through 
the drifting clouds down the gorge towards 
the mouth of the Jordan. For the first half 



GALILEE 



211 



way it was very steep and rocky. The 
horses never seem to stumble, but often 
stop and have a good look round to see the 
best way. Several times my feet touched 
against the rocks as the horse climbed down. 
The sun began to rise as we got near 
Chorazin, and the rest of the way was not 
so steep, but just a matter of riding through 
fields partly rocky, partly wayside, partly 
thistles, and some pretty good ground down 
from hill to hill till we reached the mouth 
of the Jordan. Chorazin, now called Ke- 
razeh, is just simply a heap of shapeless 
ruins. By some mistake we passed it un- 
noticed, the man who was with us knowing 
nothing and being unable to understand 
why we wanted to go so far round to get 
to the boat. The Jordan at its mouth runs 
swiftly out into the lake over a shallow 
sandbank. Here were four men with a 
funnel-shaped net weighted all round the 
bottom, which they swung round their 
heads and threw out over the water, and 
the fish which were inside the circle became 
entangled in the net as they drew it in. As 
I reached the mouth first I determined to 



212 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

ford across the sandbank, which forms a 
regular bar. The water at its deepest did 
not quite reach the stirrups. I should think 
our Lord must often have crossed here. 
One tried to imagine the crowd fording as 
they hurried along the shore looking out 
over the water to see where the boat was 
going to land (Matt. xiv. 13). The mu- 
kareh (man with the horses) was yelling 
to me to come back, but I did not under- 
stand why, and pushed on to the other 
side ; however, on returning I found out the 
reason, for starting to ride westward we 
were at once held up by a picket of soldiers, 
as the further side of the river was in 
quarantine because of the cholera at Da- 
mascus. After a good talk, in which our 
man explained that we were really coming 
from Safed, and that the doctor lived there, 
they reluctantly gave way and we rode past. 
We saw by the lakeside a fishing-boat 
pulled up on the beach with six men pre- 
paring a large net, and reined up a moment 
to watch them. They too stopped their 
work to watch us, but I don't suppose they 
guessed the thoughts passing through my 



GALILEE 213 

mind. This north shore consists of little 
bays so small that the people could have 
sat on the rocks all round and heard our 
Lord as He spoke from the boat. From 
the shore the rocky fields stretch away over 
the hills to the mountains, reminding one 
of the parable of the Sower. We soon 
reached Tel Hum, which is situated on a 
slight promontory in the middle of the north 
side. It is of all places in Galilee the one 
which I wanted to see most, and I was very 
glad to find it practically unspoilt. It now 
seems to be generally agreed that this is 
Capernaum. The word "Capher" means a 
village, and is still used in names such as 
Capher-Yussif, etc. The word " Tel " is ex- 
tremely common, and represents a **heap" 
of ruins where there has been a village or 
town. It is the same in Hebrew, and is 
used several times (Josh. viii. 28, etc.). So 
when Capher-na-Hum became a Tel, or 
ruin, it was naturally called Tel Hum. 
This being so it makes this spot of excep- 
tional interest as the centre of our Lord's 
mission work. The ruins of the same old 
town or colony, for it had no walls, still lie 



214 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

around; behind are the same hills where 
the sower still goes forth to sow ; in front, 
the same lake still rippling on the shore, 
and in the distance are the same old moun- 
tains. It is good to have seen this spot 
before it has been covered with modern 
buildings. 

It is striking when you remember the 
denunciations against these places where 
Christ spent so much time preaching to find 
them just heaps of ruins all level with the 
ground — Capernaum, Bethsaida, Bethesda, 
Chorazin, Magdala. We had lunch by the 
side of the ruin of the old synagogue, which 
has been found in a wonderful state of pre- 
servation, the whole of the ground plan 
and steps, etc., remaining in position, and 
the sculptured capitals lying in heaps just 
where they fell. Its plan proves it to be 
of about the time of our Lord, yet experts 
say its architecture shows decided Roman 
influence, which seems strange for a 
synagogue, until one compares it with 
St. Luke vii. 4, 5. It appears certain that 
these are the ruins of that building, but 
it is of much greater interest still. In 



GALILEE 215 

St. John vi. 59 we read the sermon which 
Christ preached on the text concerning 
manna (ver. 31) was delivered here. On 
one of the large stones there is said to be 
an engraving which represents the pot of 
manna, and may have occasioned the dis- 
course (cf. Palestine Exploration Fund 
Second Quarterly Statement). 

The entrances at the top of the stairs are 
very distinct, the stone is well footworn, and 
there is a socket at the side for the door 
hinge. 

From Tel Hum it was three-quarters of 
an hour to Tabegah, where we were to catch 
the steamer. We had luckily timed it just 
right, and arrived at the little pier exactly 
as the boat reached it, having passed seven 
strongly flowing springs, which burst out of 
the hillside and rushed down into the lake. 
There are the remains of an old water-mill, 
and an old aqueduct which used to carry the 
water right round the hill to Khan Minyeh, 
which is just on the plain of Gennesaret, 
and is supposed by some to be Bethsaida. 

At Tabegah there is nothing but a little 
convent and tiny wooden pier which stands 



2i6 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

out into the lake. The boat was rather 
larger than a big motor launch, and went 
at quite a good pace. As we steamed 

across the perfectly smooth lake Mr. S 

told us how he has seen it get so rough that 
the waves have cleared the tower of the sea 
wall at Tiberias (about i8 feet), and the 
water has poured down into his garden on 
the other side. We reached Tiberias in 
forty-five minutes. Some naked little Arabs 
were having great fun with a canoe made 
of a sheet of corrugated iron bent double. 
From here we steamed in another fifty 
minutes to Semach at the extreme south 
end of the lake. This place has a curious 
look as you approach it, the water being 
prevented from bodily emptying itself down 
the valley by a sand cliff about 20 feet high 
and several miles long. At Semach we 
landed and hastened into the station which 
is by the lakeside. Before our train started, 
the one from Damascus came in on the loop 
line, but a cordon of soldiers was at once 
made between the trains as the one coming 
in had to wait twenty-four hours for quaran- 
tine and ours had done the same. Poor 



GALILEE 217 
things, I did pity them, * and was much 




amused to see their efforts to get across to 
our train without being seen. We could 

p 



2i8 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

shake hands with these passengers from our 
windows. One man pretended he was a 
doctor. I know I should have made an 
effort myself. 

After travelling a good way down the 
level plain of the Jordan, we turned more 
westward, crossing the Garmuk (a tributary 
of Jordan), and then the river itself which 
was winding its way through the strange 
sand pinnacles so characteristic of the neigh- 
bourhood. As we crossed each river or 
rushing trout stream, close by the railway 
bridges were old Roman road-bridges which 
were and are still on the caravan route 
from Africa into Asia, the old track along 
which we could watch the camels trudging 
in the same old track along which the 
caravans of centuries have plodded. Time 
seems to have stood still. Surely those are 
the Midianite merchantmen now returning 
from Egypt and congratulating themselves 
on their good bargain made with Potiphar. 

Surely the ages of science and civilization 
belong to some other world ; all here looks 
peaceful, contented, no one worries, no one 
hurries. *'Hovoot" ("Tickets, please"). 



GALILEE 219 

The dream is gone ! In three minutes we 
reach Beisan. I looked out for fat bulls, but 
this is not the place, or the lean ones must 
have devoured the well favoured. From 
here we went up the broad and very fertile 
"vale of Jezreel/' which gradually ascends 
from the Jordan Valley up to the plain 
of Esdraelon. We had turned north-west. 
On our left were the slopes of the Mountain 
of Gilboa, where Saul was encamped on 
the last night of his life, and over Little 
Hermon on our right is Endor. What 
a state of mind must he have been in 
that night that he should have crossed this 
wide valley where the Philistines were en- 
camped ! It was on the heights of Gilboa 
that Saul and Jonathan died with the flower 
of the Israelite army. It is noteworthy 
that though Carmel and Gilboa are really 
spurs of one range, Carmel is so very 
fertile and Gilboa so absolutely barren 
(2 Sam. i. 21). 

The next station was Afuleh, in the middle 
of the plain. Here to the north we could 
see Nazareth on the hills, and to the south 
the branch line which has already been 



220 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

begun and will be extended to Jerusalem. 
The last station before Haifa is about 15 
miles inland, opposite the place of sacrifice 
on Carmel and near the Vale of Dothan 
where Joseph was cast into the pit. You 
see, we are still close to the old trade route 
into Egypt. As for the actual pit, I believe 
there is the traditional one, but these holes 
are extremely numerous everywhere, being 
cut out of the rock to hold water in places 
where the winter torrents will fill them. 
They are not covered, the opening being 
about a yard in diameter, but inside there 

is plenty of room. 
There is no possi- 
bility of getting out 
unaided. The Arabs, 
according to their 
picturesque custom, 
have improved upon the story. They say 
that when the brothers saw him coming 
they covered the hole over with a mat and 
all sat round to eat bread. When Joseph 
arrived they asked him to sit in the middle 
to tell them of their old father, and any 
more^dreams he might have had. However, 




GALILEE 



221 



before he finished his story, at a sign they 
all stood up and Joseph slipped through 
into the pit. 

Just as we left the last station, the train 
stopped. An official came running up to 
the driver. We then backed to the platform, 
and everybody got out and began racing 
up and down in a great state of excite- 
ment. We were unable to make out what 
had happened till we found a Jew to whom 

M. W was able to speak in Yiddish. 

The station-master had just received a 
telegram that the Italians had landed at 
Haifa, and were advancing along the line. 
After a while this was modified, they had 
not yet landed, but it would not be safe to 
go on. There were no houses about, we 
had not had much to eat, and there was 
only a piece of melon left, and a bit of crust 
which I had pushed into my pocket. For 
two hours we walked up and down the line 
determined to stick to the train. The sun 
went down and it became quite dark. 
Suddenly there was a shout and every one 
got in again. The train must hurry on as 
it was wanted to remove valuables, etc., 



222 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

from Haifa. The Italians were not timed 
to land till ii p.m. As trains on this line 
only run by day, men had to come out from 
the town with lanterns to signal it in. 
When we arrived we found about ten 
engines all with full steam up, and blowing 
off clouds of smoke, ready to leave at a 
moment's notice. An official told me that 
they had already sent away the money from 
the banks and also the documents. I sup- 
pose the engines were to take the soldiers 
out of harm's way. We went on to the 
hotel, where we heard more rumours of the 
attack. However, we slept well that night, 
and as far as I know no Italian ship ever 
came on the horizon. 

I have reached Jerusalem again after a 
very jolly time. On arriving at the coast, 
I found the steamer was not to reach Haifa 
until the next day. However, we were 
awakened at sunrise by the boots, who said, 
" Steamer just in, may stay an hour," and 
so had to pack, breakfast, drive to quay, and 
row out to the boat. It was done. 

I determined to try without Thos. Cook. 
The day before had been quite rough, and 



GALILEE 223 

they had doubted if we should be able to 
land at Jaffa, but during the night the sea 
went down, and we had a fairly calm 
passage. Doing without "Cook*' means 
a most awful fight and bargaining. If you 
have his ticket you are at once surrounded 
by his men, like a body-guard, and the 
independent mob can't get near you. I had 
heard before of the awful fight that some- 
times goes on if you try to do things for 
yourself, but did not expect all I got. 

The boats catch on to the side of the 
steamer before she stops, and always seem 
to get half swamped. The men do not wait 
for ladders, but swarm up the sides like 
lizards. Ropes, portholes, exhaust pipes, 
anything seems sufficient for them to climb 
up by, and before the steamer has come to 
a standstill they are pouring over the hand- 
rail in a human flood, like the rats after the 
Pied Piper. There were very few passengers 
for Jaffa. I could see there would be a 
fight so stood over my bag ready, intending 
to do things very calmly, and try to teach 
these men a lesson, but before I was ashore, 
I had to shout once or twice and show my 



224 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

teeth. I know I patted two of them. They 
make a rush for your luggage because they 
know if they can get that you are bound to 
follow. I was just enjoying myself warding 
off a few on one side and keeping them well 
at bay, when I turned and saw my bag, 
which had been behind me, just disappearing 
down a ladder in the hands of a man, who 
was shouting to me to follow, and saying 
it was "All right,*' "All right.'' I chased 
after him, and asked whose luggage he was 
stealing, and who the bag belonged to? 
He said he thought it was mine. I said, 
" What if it belongs to that lady over there, 
and she doesn't want to get off at Jaffa ? " 
He hastily put it back and started to search 
for mine. Some said if I would come with 
them I should not have to wait, but I told 
them I was enjoying the view. 

Some said the sea was getting rough, and 
I agreed with them that there was not much 
fun in going ashore just yet. They hardly 
seemed to understand, but all tried to get 
me into their boats by grabbing my bag and 
screaming like wild cats. I had to wrestle 
with several. Finally, I picked up the 



GALILEE 225 



luggage and thought to calmly climb down 
the swinging stairway, and get into a boat 
unaided, but the men were determined to 
have their own back, and that ladder was 
by no means easy with a bag and a parcel. 
Two men were trying to get up and two 
trying to get down, and I was between. 
Those below seemed to think their only 
way was to get up between my legs, and 
those above thought that they would surely 
get down if they rested their bundles on my 
head. I was soon hanging almost suspended 
over the sea, with one hand on a rope, and 
the other holding packages, then I left go 
and landed in a boatman's arms below. All 
this time I had been quite unable to render 
any assistance to the lady who was landing, 
or even see anything of her ; she had 
apparently hidden, but now appeared at the 
head of the ladder. I shouted to a man to 
assist her, which he promptly did. Seizing 
her in his arms, he swayed her off her feet, 
and let her drop to a man below. The next 
moment they were rowing away over the 
waves singing their song and laughing at 
the others who had to go without passengers. 



226 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

Here, at Jerusalem, everything is in a 
state of excitement and suspense.* The 
war scare is creating great interest as the 
men are being taken to fight. (They were 
unable to go to Tripoli as the Italians held 
the sea.) We hear rumours daily of wars 
and treaties, of massacres and conspiracies, 
and yet nobody seems as yet to know any- 
thing definite. For some days we have 
been entirely without news, and we all 
anxiously await the next telegrams. Yester- 
day the reservists (men between thirty and 
forty years) were called out, and a large 
number marched past the hotel on their 
way north. It is said they will go all the 
way to Constantinople. The barracks are 
a perfect prison for those who have been 
taken, who will be sent off during the night 
up north. As I went past they were 
stretching out their lean arms through the 
iron bars of the windows for the food which 
the women were bringing them, because the 
authorities are too busy to provide it. Cans 
of water were suspended outside, just as 
tins of water are fastened to the bars of a 

* The war between Turkey and the Balkan States. 



JERUSALEM 227 

canary cage. They are raising enthusiasm 
by describing the cause as one of defence 
against the infidels, and are doing all they 
can to excite the mob. One man on a tub 
was leaping into the air and waving a sword, 
two others fired oflf pistols. Others again 
formed into lines and clapped and sang to 
their curious rhythm ; and as the poor 
ignorant fellows in their excitement offered 
to fight, they were carried shoulder high 
into the barracks, from w,hich some few 
hours later (under cover of darkness) they 
were marched off in gangs, surrounded by 
soldiers to start their weary tramp north. 
One scene just outside our school, which 
faces the barracks, was most impressive. A 
very old sheik, who looked as if he might 
have been the shade of some ancient 
prophet, had fetched from a mosque a large 
purple banner. He stood in the midst of 
the crowd, and there was a momentary 
I silence as he lifted up his hands to heaven, 
and called down a blessing on those who 
should defend it. All the people cried 
" Amen,'' which is of course an Eastern 
word ; then, after an impressive pause, he 



228 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

turned round and round and shouted, " This 
banner goes to the war, who goes to defend 
it ? I was not there myself, but was told 
that something like 200 more men came 
forward and offered for the fight. The 
authorities are laying hands on all they can 
see. Drivers dare not bring their horses 
into the towns, as they will probably be 
commandeered. 

Yesterday I heard of one man who lost 
three horses for less than the price of one. 
The camel ground outside the J aft a gate is 
empty, and there. is not a camel to be seen in 
the city. Orders have been given that on 
no account are the persons or goods of any 
foreigners to be touched. 

The .situation here is curious. The Arabs 
hate the Turks, who are very brutal to them, 
but being Moslems, they always want the 
Turks to win. In spite of the excitement 
the conscript reserve are doing all they can 
to get out of fighting ; 24,000 pounds 
Turkish (i pound = 23 francs) was paid in 
two days in Jerusalem by men who wished 
to buy themselves out. 

Mr. H — — has just got back from Beyrout ; 



JERUSALEM 229 

he has been telling me about, the Italians 
bombarding the place in the spring. There 
was great excitement when their men-of-war 
appeared and signalled for the surrender of 
the two Turkish gunboats in the bay. The 
people and soldiers rushed to the barracks, 
and grabbing all the rifles and revolvers 
they could find, began shouting and firing at 
random at the battleships which were far 
away on the sky-line. One man in his 
excitement jumped into a rowing boat, and 
was pushed off from the shore waving his 
native slippers and shouting in triumph, 
With these shoes I will stop up the mouths 
of their guns.". With a long-distance gun 
the Italians fired high into the air and right 
over the city. A few moments later there 
was not a native to be seen. As their ships 
entered the bay one of the Turkish gunboats 
fired twice, the shots landing in gardens on 
the other side. The Italians fired two 
torpedoes, and in twenty minutes there was 
only one funnel of the Turkish gunboats 
above water. 

It may be interesting to note that the 
natives and Jews all think that England will 



230 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

come and take this country. Two hundred 
Jews went down to the station the other day 
to welcome the English soldiers, whom they 
heard were coming up by train. 

We have just been for a scientific expedi- 
tion. For some years past careful measure- 
ments have been made of the height of the 
Dead Sea, which is only kept down by 
evaporation. We went to take further 
details, also a German professor is conduct- 
ing an inquiry into the causes of malaria, 
which is so extremely common. He is 
examining the blood of every man, woman, 
child, he can get, and has a suspicion that 
the fever comes from the people of the 
Jordan Valley. We went down to bleed all 
we could persuade to submit, and to bring 
their blood up to be examined. It was 
great fun. The malaria germ can only pass 
one stage of development in the blood of a 
human, and the other only in the body of a 
mosquito, hence a man cannot get it except 
from a mosquito bite, and this insect cannot 
infect him unless it has already bitten a man, 
who has the germs in his body. 

Well, we hired horses — the owner gave 



THE JORDAN VALLEY 231 

me a ^'bishlek" (sixpence) as a pledge*' 
that he would bring one ; he called it an 
arrabon, obviously the same word as the 
Greek dppd/3cov in Eph. i. 14. We set out at 
10.30 a.m. and rode till about 1.45, when we 
reached the second inn on the Jericho road. 
Here we began our operations. One of the 
innkeeper's daughters was the first to offer. 
With a fine needle the doctor probed the, 
lobe of her ear, and then smeared the blood 
on two microscopic slides. Some of the 
people were rather alarmed, but we laughed 
at them, chased them about, and amidst the 
merriment of the rest caught them one at 
a time, and held them down whilst the 
doctor did them. There was one negro 
whose skin was so tough that he did not 
seem to feel anything, and we had great 
difficulty in getting any blood. They all 
seemed to enjoy the joke when their turn 
was over, but evidently thought we were 
quite mad. We then rode on to Jericho, 
where there was a splendid catch ; in fact, we 
were quite besieged by people who wanted 
to be bled. It was amusing to see the 
natives jumping about with glee and very 



232 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

proud of the little bit of cotton-wool sticking 
to their ears, a kind of badge that their turn 
was over. (Subsequent examination of the 
slides showed that though most of the people 
examined had the fever germs in their system 
they had not that type of germ which could 
infect mosquitoes, and thus be a danger to 
others.) 

Next morning we started by moonlight 
for the Dead Sea. We rode down the west 
side through jungles of reeds and bushes, 
the springs being here very abundant. At 
length we reached Ain Feshla, where the 
mountains descend straight into the water. 

Here is the mark on the face of the rock 
where the Palestine Exploration Fund makes 
measurements. As the water was rather 
wavy we had some difficulty in determining 
the exact level of the sea, so we made 
independent observations, and on comparing 
notes found we agreed within half an inch. 
The sea during the dry summer had gone 
down one foot nine inches, which is rather 
less than usual, as the weather has not been 
quite so warm as usual. We met several 
Arabs about and flocks of goats and sheep, 



THE JORDAN VALLEY 233 

but our party was large enough for it to be 

quite safe. Once or twice Mr. H has 

had some excitement here, even being fired 

at, and Mr. E had his donkey shot under 

him. We turned towards Jerusalem up one 
of the gorges, the wildness of which is far 
beyond description. Sometimes we had to 
lead the horses, and could often have jumped 
off their backs several hundred feet down the 
cliffs. 

On the top of one of these hills we came 
to the buildings of Neby Mousa, where at 
Easter the Moslems have their great week 
of feasting, their " Tomb of Moses." 
During this part of year it is absolutely 
deserted though as large as small barracks. 
It was very strange walking about into the 
various rooms and not seeing a person. Mr. 

H said that it is a famous haunt for 

robbers, and we were all to enter together. 

On one occasion when he had some school- 
boys with him they were just entering when 
they discovered a lot of robbers fast asleep. 
He at once retired, and had the donkeys 
hidden in a valley some way off, and then they 
all sprang in together shouting, Friends, 

Q 



234 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

friends." The robbers woke up with a start, 
and when they saw their numbers welcomed 
them as friends. The Arabs had a lot of 
camels with them which had been stolen, 
and these were being taken off to Gaza to 
be sold. 

When we entered, the place was quite 
deserted. After looking at the tomb, where 
our muleteer said his prayers, we rode on. 
A small Moslem shrine was the only other 
building we passed until we reached 
Bethany, getting home to Jebus in the 
dark. 

MiCHMASH 

Yesterday, being free, I determined to do 
Michmash, Bethel, etc. We rode along the 
Nablus road over Mount Scopus, soon 
branching off on the old north road so 
graphically described in Isa. x. 28, etc. 
Passing near Anathoth we descended from 
the bleak heights of the watershed into the 
glorious sea of hills and wadies with their 
olive groves and vine terraces, their 
shepherds with sheep and goats, and clustered 



MICHMASH 235 

villages. Soon we were leading our horses 
as we clambered up from the rocky bed, 
keeping as much as possible on the patches 
of rich red soil, which lie everywhere in the 
ledges of the grey rock. At the top of this 
hill we found a little bunch of grey stone 
houses (or rooms) ; fierce-looking wolf-like 
dogs heralded our approach, beasts which 
seemed ready to tear us to pieces ; then a 
swarm of women and children came out and 
crowded round us, almost everybody having 
bad eyes and not above asking for "back- 
shish." After looking a moment over the 
ocean of hilltops down to the Dead Sea, we 
again descended and rode to Hismath, where 
we were rapturously welcomed by the old 
sheik and all the village. I had learnt to 
know him well as he was accidentally shot 
in the summer and remained for some weeks 
in our hospital. He at once spread a fine 
carpet outside his house, began to make 
coffee, and was just sending to kill one of the 
flock when we said we could not stay long ; 
so after a short rest we rode down into the 
valley, where there are some strange remains 
of massive masonry, called locally Tombs 



236 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

of the Children of Israel," evidently very old 
and, according to some modern authorities, 
on the site of Rachael's tomb. Here we 
found and ate some mushrooms. 

We pass Geba or Gebeah, or a hilltop, 
and went down into the pass where Jonathan 
and his armour-bearer climbed up against 
the Philistines (i Sam. xiv.). A little 
further the wady became absolutely preci- 
pitous, and here I could see easily the two 
rocks mentioned in ver. 4, two huge buttresses 
of rock which stand out from either side as 
if they would block up the wady altogether. 
The scene is wonderfully described in 
I Sam. xiv. There is an enormous cave on 
the south side with a small entrance now 
called "the cave of the Benjamites.'' Saul 
and Jonathan were Benjamites. " Hands 
and feet*' (ver. 13), the only possible way 
of climbing this cliff ; ver. 14 describes a 
common Eastern way of reckoning, and there, 
right on the top of the cliff, we saw a patch 
of soil between the rocks which had just 
been ploughed. A winding path led us up 
to Michmash, still like the other places 
called by its Biblical name ; here old Achmed 



MICHMASH 237 

the sheik left us, and so riding to Ai of 
Josh, viii., we passed close by the place 
where the prophet must have been killed by 
the lion (i Kings xiii. 24). 

Ai is on a steep hill where there are now 
no houses. It is known as the Tell, or 
"heap," as described in Joshua. Passing 
on to Bethel, we saw the ruin of an old 
Crusaders' church, and later a more perfect 
one at Beeroth. These churches must have 
been very numerous at that time. At 
Bethel we saw but little to remark, except 
an enormous reservoir, which shows how 
large this place must once have been. There 
is still a good-sized native village. Its 
desecration seems to have been so thoroughly 
carried out in Joshua's time that it does not 
appear to be again mentioned in Old or New 
Testaments, unless Bethany (Hosea x. 5) 
refers to it, where the prophet seems to 
change El (= God) into "aven" (— idol). 

From here we rode on to Beeri, finally 
returning home by the modern road. 



BACK TO PALESTINE 



BACK TO PALESTINE 



Feb.y 19 1 8. — Just left Cairo and swinging 
along for Kantara on the Canal, going up to 
dear old Jerusalem. It is just over five 
years since I left, and that was under very 
different circumstances. We are, I think, 
the first English civilians to go up, except 
four who went as agents of the Relief Fund. 
It will be a very interesting journey ; the 
Israelites were forty years reaching the 
promised land, we should be one night. 
They tramped the burning desert, we glide 
along in a sleeper under the full moon. On 
either side the cold moonlight glistens on 
the sandy hills, or the deep shadows lie 
where, lightly covered with earth, rest the 
bodies of those by whose sacrifice a way 
was opened to the Holy City, The train 
is full from end to end with officers and men 
returning to the front. Such a fine, clean, 
healthy set of men. If the spirits of those 

241 



242 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

who rest in the eternal desert can see these 
men hastening forward over the ground 
they have won, to take their place in the roll 
of fame, they would rest assured that they 
had not died in vain. At Kantara I got 
my bags into a motor lorry, which was 
waiting to carry everything across the pon- 
toon bridge. There was a crowd of officers 
and soldiers, but I was the only civilian. 
They all looked at me in the moonlight, and 
I heard some one say, Look who comes 
'ere. Bill." However, the military police 
had evidently been instructed. I soon got 
my pass examined. 

Crossing the Canal, I found the Bishop 
surrounded by a number of officers, who had 
evidently come to see that all was correct. 
Really I feel quite ashamed to see the 
luxury with which I am about to travel. 
The main part of the train is rough suburban 
carriages for the men, with one or two 
sleeping berths for officers, but our carriage 
is used by generals, berths, a saloon with 
tables and chairs, and a fine kitchen. 

Feb, 28th.— Dear old Jerusalem. I can 



BACK TO PALESTINE 243 

hardly take in the fact that I am here in my 
sitting-room looking on to the Mount of 
Olives, over the slopes of which, a few 
weeks ago, the Tommies fought their way. 
In the distance to the north I can see Neby 
Samwil, where so many lost their lives, 
and behind there fighting is still going on. 
We hear bursts of gunfire now and then. 
The distant hills dotted about with tents, 
and motor lorries can be seen dashing about 
on the mountain tracks. Well, I must try 
to tell my story. 

I woke up yesterday at sunrise to find we 
were still in the desert, but just crossing the 
border into Palestine. We drew up at a 
large oasis, and pointed out where our first 
relief unit had been on the edge of the 
desert. An hour later we were passing 
through a grassy plain, which divides two 
hills, behind the more distant of which is 
Gaza. It was across this plain that the 
British had to advance to capture it. The 
hill on which the Turks were posted was 
thickly covered with cactus and shrubs, but 
the plain in front was absolutely without 
cover ! Shortly after we were running right 



244 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

through Gaza, a complete ruin now with the 
railway wandering right across it, though a 
year ago it was an important town. After 
breakfast we rolled on along the line north- 
ward, seeing Askalon in the distance. Some 
boys selling oranges said they came from 
Ashdod. We bought four for i^d. At last 
we found ourselves in low rolling hills with 
olive trees. 

After we had paid a visit to the G.H.Q. 
we changed into a Ford car and had a 
wonderful ride up the wild rocky passes to 
Jerusalem, 2500 feet up. It took us three 
and a quarter hours. There was a storm 
and the roads were deep in mud. There 
were streams and streams of huge motor 
lorries struggling along the slippery rocks, 
and tents scattered over the hills every- 
where. Six times we stuck and once nearly 
turned over, several times we had to wait 
for cars to pass on some precipitous cliff 
or hairpin bend. At last we crossed the 
deep valley at Emmaus, and soon were 
among the red-tiled Jewish houses which 
reach over the hills on the north of the city. 
I was able to guide my driver by a short 



BACK TO PALESTINE 245 

cut, and so we got to our gateway about 
ten minutes before the others. Jumping out 
I shouted, ^' El Metran ! " ('^ The Bishop ! 

then , who has kept everything going 

through the war, came out, and the various 
servants ; so we welcomed the Anglican 
Bishop to his new home. We went over 
the house and found everything well kept. 
All were full of stories of the past three 
years, as how the mayor sat at the writing- 
desk and signed the document handing over 
the city to the British. The gardener pre- 
sented the Bishop with a Turkish rifle, 
dropped by a soldier when he fled through 
the garden. We then went into the 
cathedral, which we found in the same 
state in which it was when sealed by the 
American consul three and a half years 
ago. We knelt in prayer and thanksgiving, 
and were shown the hole made by the 
Turks searching for cannon (mistaking our 
canons for guns), and the one window 
which had been broken after a Russian 
victory in Asia Minor. Next we visited 
the clergy house, library, boys' school — now 
in full swing — and the girls' school, now 



246 ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM 

turned into a big industrial institution, 
where were 170 women making garments. 
How they blessed the Bishop and the 
Fund ! 

This morning we went (with the old 
Bishop's cawass, i.e. soldier servant carrying 
a sword in front) to visit some of the Relief 
Institutions. The orphanage is great. Miss 

W has got hold of a big Austrian 

hospice, and now already has 106 children. 
We saw there one little girl of eleven who 
had been married twice. Her first husband 
was divorced, and her second had gone off 
to the war, leaving her destitute. Yesterday 
we received official calls from the repre- 
sentatives of the Greek, Coptic, and Syrian 
Churches, and to-day we have been to 
return them at the monasteries clustering 
round the old Church of the Holy Sepulchre. 
We were received by abbots and arch- 
deacons, as the Patriarchs and Bishops of 
the different Churches have been carried off. 
It gave me a bit of a thrill when, passing 
through the courtyard of the old church 
where the Crusaders worshipped, I saw 
" Tommy " standing sentry with fixed 



BACK TO PALESTINE 247 

bayonet. These are certainly wonderful 
days. On all sides are evidences of the 
exciting historical events which have so 
recently taken place. 



THE END 



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